¶ Personal Branding Not Required for Business
I believe in what I'm about to say more than I believe that the sun will come up tomorrow. It is not required to build a personal brand to build a business. You will not die. Your business will not die if you're not a personal brand. It is a lever, but let me tell you what else is a good lever. Being good at sales. Let me tell you what else is a good lever. Being good at making social media content that does not have you in it. Let me tell you what else is a good lever.
Being such a charismatic, warm-hearted boss that everybody wants to work for you forever. Like I mean there's a million levers in business being an innovator, you know, an inventor of new things. There's many things. That one can be that will explode their business. Personal brand just happens to be one of them. Is the Gary B audio experience? Hi everyone. Hi everyone. Hi, hi, hi. Woo! What's up, vibe, vibe family? Great to see you.
ton of time so we're gonna jump on in we're so we so appreciate your uh your coming in and letting us ask some questions so we've got six fibers that are gonna be chiming on in today um kick off with Miss Diane um with a brilliant question. Diane!
¶ Authentic Social Impact for Brands
Hi Gary.
Nice to meet you. I'm Diane and I am the fashion designer of an impact brand called Bienna BA. We make um product with artisan women in Hayes. And I also wear another hat where I'm the founder of an organization called Fleur de V that does um edu promotes education in Haiti.
as well. And so I have two questions. The first one is in regards to the current market and how the current market is shifting away from sustainability and social impact product. How would you say such brand should try to stay relevant and break through barriers in this market.
Well it's a great question.
All questions at once.
Let's get it
You guys can hear me, right? Yeah. Diane, it's a great question. Here's what I would say. I would I would say that I wouldn't say that the current trends of consumers are walking away from sustainability or social impact. You know, I was really there when sustainability and social impact brands started to really pump out. And l I would tell you that One of the things that really bothered me was a lot of the early brands actually meant it.
Right? Like if you go back to 2006, 7, 8, when you started to see this movement gain a lot of momentum, a lot of the brands that I was pitched to invest in or the founders I would be on the same stages with, they really meant it. Right? It was like in their soul, you know, kind of like the way I'm sure it's in your soul that I can sense, right?
What ended up happening was we're we're not in this place because of political changes. We're in this place because so many people started companies and used social you know, and used sustainability as a marketing tactic. It wasn't authentic. I remember when there was a tipping point, somebody came in and pitched me an umbrella brand. And they said, Gary, this is our umbrella brand.
And for everyone who buys one umbrella, we donated umbrella to someone in like a third world. I was like and then when I looked under the hood, we were I was the consumer was paying double for the umbrella. And it just got yucky. And I think the consumer caught up to it. So here's what I would say. Many people, me included, would buy something because of a social reason or a sustainable reason.
Many other people might buy something just because they think the color blue is pretty or they like the flavor of the coffee. Mm-hmm. I don't think that you can get into a mental place where you think that your business or your product is at as i ha is on its back foot because it's off trend right now. If your product is only selling because it's more charity than it is product, you never had a real business to begin with.
So you need to think about the social impact or sustainability as a plus up, as one of the reasons someone's buying something, not the reason someone's buying something. You understand? So I think getting your head into like okay, now let me make pret like the w when I do altruistic things or or if I'm involved in a business that has a noble cause or a sustainable cause, my brain goes to Let's run this as if it doesn't. And then we'll just get extra because it does.
And I think you need to operate that way. And so you need to make sure your product, your service is priced properly, is a good product. And has a proper marketing demand engine, and you should not shy away from making content around the nobleness. but you should also make content around other reasons people should buy the thing. And you should be in the ma in the and mindset, not the or mindset.
Completely understand.
Thank you. You're welcome.
¶ Overcoming Non-Profit Donor Fatigue
And then my next question is on the non profit side of me. where um Fleur de V is all about promoting education in Haiti. What we do is we partner with schools and needs in promoting education, health, and primar and sustain uh environmental sustainability to the primary school kids. And so currently we're building um a school and we're rebuilding a school in Haiti and we're actually doing mental health.
School in the capital and what we've noticed is there's been such bad press around Haiti that there's this shift. It's kind of like donor fatigue. So how does one get beyond donor fatigue? and and still keep promoting the need to educate the masses.
I uh there's a lot to this. Um uh give me one second. Um, donor fatigue comes in many shapes and sizes. Um again, I think everything is storytelling, everything in life is is communications, everything is about empathy when you're a marketer, right? So To me, you know, I think that there's Always donor fatigue. And occasionally there's not. So I sit on a ton of nonprofits. I consult a lot of nonprofits.
I'm very passionate about giving back. And I always remind people, do not have the audacity that what you care about is what everyone should care about. Right? Someone who is from Haiti, who's been donating to Haiti, God forbid tomorrow might have a child that gets a disease that's life threatening and that person has all the right To start shifting their dollars to curing that disease versus Haiti, their beloved nation that they were born in and their parents and grandparents.
Again, I think we need to have compassion to donors. I am very aware of the narrative that you're speaking to on Haiti. I can tell you There are plenty of people that do not. There are plenty of people with a video or a picture today on Instagram or Facebook that would be hearing for the first time. a compelling reason why they should care about giving to Haiti and m that might be the day. And so this concept of donor fatigue is very insular to the people that have
Given in the past, and you know this, there's always something that pops up that gets the attention of people. I I wouldn't overly dwell on the shortcomings of the narrative. Because there's nothing that's gonna be productive of us being worried or concerned about the fatigue or the narrative that's currently out there. What I would focus on is telling stories in a contemporary way.
And getting them out there, whatever those stories can be. So, you know, donor fatigue is universal. We see it everywhere.
St. Jude's
you know, charity water, pencils of promise, these things where I see the data clearly, they go through ebbs and flows of their donor fatigue, Sesame Street. Uh you know, but One piece of content, one documentary, one interview, one social media post can change the narrative. So I would say my long-winded answer to you is don't give a shit about it and make more stories. Okay.
Thank you.
You're welcome. Thank you. You're welcome.
¶ AI Tools for Real Estate Media
Hey Gary, good to see you again.
Great to see you great.
All right, so I assume I'll just dive right in. So uh years ago you spoke at the Inmin conference for real estate agents and you said something to the effect of you need to be the digital mayor of your town. Does that sound familiar?
Very much. It gets brought up all the time.
That one line has had such a profound impact on our business, it would blow your mind. So we have bridged the gap in the real estate community to actually making that come to fruition for top agents. So I'm the CEO and founder of American Dream Media. The way you want to look at it is when we think of TV shows, reality TV, we're the opposite.
Real shows, real professionals airing on major networks. We have about twelve hundred of the best agents in the country. And I would look at it through the lens of think of it like a B2B model first that creates a B2C show that airs on major networks.
Networks. I know the I know the I know the I know the model very well.
Cool. So that's what we do. And We've done well. And it's a napkin story that's grown into a pretty successful company and we're looking to level up. A lot of things I could ask of you, but I want to bet on the future here. Another quote you have is it's a technological tide wave you better
Surf it or you're gonna drown. So we're ready to surf. So we're making a big investment into the future, AI, building our brains, so to speak, integration, and we want to innovate into the real estate sector uh beyond what we've already done in media. So if if you or us
What would your approach to the future be in the vertical of real estate, niched in media, marketing and AI? How would you gain what is gonna be a very unique, addressable market in the future and what really is a scorched earth in in the greatest disruption we probably will ever see in our lifetime?
So obviously your business, correct me if I'm wrong, your your your addressable market is real estate agents who have an interest to use the television medium as a demand creation for their personal brand to build up their business.
Everybody wants to be rhyme surgeon. Yeah.
So I think you know, it's very obvious that You can create products and services for that same addressable market That are AI tools for them. So you building the AI apps that they become customers of. at a low cost SaaS entry that is a appetizer, a mousse boosh, or dessert for your main business is what I would build. And I used the terminology in a restaurant very specifically.
and a mousse boosh and a appetizer as a gateway drug to your core business or an a dessert that is something that they do with you after your core business is the ecosystem I would build.
I agree. I think uh what we're trying to do is know the way, then show the way. So the way I've kind of framed it for my team, my leadership team is with AI, we're gonna integrate. We're gonna show how we can integrate this into our business, become more creative, more efficient, more scalable.
uh through innovate it's well as we're learning these things and building our brain and all these cool things that are applicable to us, we cannot only take them to our constituency, but our hope is to take it outside of those 1200 realtors to the 1.5 million real estate agencies. as a whole and either into other verticals.
I think that's right. I think you just wanna not be too naive. as you start to think about other verticals and have bigger eyes. know that you're gonna start running into companies that look like OpenAI and Anthropic and Google. And so I you know, I would just say be thoughtful of how you play it because once you once you go into bigger waters, you're gonna find very different sharks.
Well, that said, um, it's it it is a media company, but you know, primarily to the client base it's a a marketing company and AI just disrupts all of that. So we're really excited about it. Uh I know that you have kind of dabbled in real estate. I saw you at Agent 2020. Do you remember that event?
Of course.
Miami.
And so uh a lot of what you've taught, a lot of what you've done, uh y Vayner Media and Gary V are in the DNA of our organization. So I owe you
Very humbled. Very humble.
for all that you've impacted what we do and our growth and in the value provided to our clients.
thank you my brother
I could definitely keep going.
Because
Andrea, you're on mute if you want to tee up some.
Right. Yeah. Gary, so you might remember
Of course.
Yes, I do.
She's still off on um Passover celebrating, but she's got a quick question on video.
For you.
I can't hear it.
Alright, why don't we switch gears um and we'll go to the next one. Uh Asta while we're fixing that.
It's fixed.
Okay.
Thank you.
Yeah.
¶ Reconsidering Personal Brand Necessity
Hey all, sorry I can't be there today, but thanks for taking this question.
Um
I'm Sarah. I'm the CEO of a small but hopefully growing disruptive CPG brand doing plant-based soup.
Uh
now launching a new SELSIM PIGUDE GAILA LINE which we're really excited about. And I'm learning that the real differentiator between private label, which is taking over the industry, and brands is a good founder story, along with a great product.
Mm-hmm.
Um the concept of a personal brand is
Okay.
I don't love the idea of creating one, but I understand it's necessary. How do I rent the band aid and get started and do it right? Hey all sorry I can't be there today but thanks for
So team, here's a fun one. I believe in what I'm about to say more than I believe that the sun will come up tomorrow. It is not required to build a personal brand, to build a business. So my answer to you is you don't need to do that. A founder story is amazing. It's another great weapon. It's obviously incredibly unique, right? It is a differentiation. Everyone here is a snowflake. We're all different. Even though we look like other people, we have similar stories, but no one has the same.
Um, I find it very challenging to tell people they have to do something. I actually think life is about figuring out what you do well and what you like to do and then you do that because you will have higher upside and most importantly more peace of mind. So even in the way she asked that question.
Like that would be like a perfect person that I would want to talk directly out of building a personal brand. Now, much like when children don't want to eat vegetables or try a new food, I think everyone should try. I think there's very little harm in trying. So I think my advice is try. How do you break out the same way, you know, I was scared of swimming when I was a kid because I thought I was gonna drown. I started swimming when I was nine years old, a little late.
But how did I break through? Well, mine was a weird story. My sister started swimming one day at the pool when she was six, and I had no ability to believe that my sister was gonna learn how to swim before me, so I literally got up from my knock hockey table and jumped directly into this pool.
pool and just started swimming and now try to claim that I started swimming before her, even though it's not true. But it it's like anything kissing I'll just use my life, riding a bike, kissing a girl, Swimming in a swimming pool, all were scary, and all of them just required a final moment of internal courage to do it. Bye. that that is um
What doing a personal brand piece of content or doing it for a month is. It's being a grown-up And getting rid of your adolescent fear, jumping in, not worrying about people's judgment, making the content, writing the article, making the video. But after 30 days, if it's not your joy, if it's a burden, unlike the thing that does not come natural to me that I do every day, which is go to the gym, I need to do that because that's really health and wellness. Like I don't want to die.
You will not die, your business will not die if you're not a personal brand. It is a lever, but let me tell you what else is a good lever. Being good at sales. Let me tell you what else is a good lever. Being good at making social media content that does not have you in it. Let me tell you what else is a good lever. Being such a charismatic, warm-hearted boss that everybody wants to work for you forever. Like I mean there's a million levers in business being an innovator.
You know, an inventor of new things. Like, I dunno, being an anthropologist of consumer behavior and trends. There's many things that one can be that will explode their business. So Personal brand just happens to be one of them. The words she used required, or I have to, are inappropriate words in business.
Okay.
¶ Scaling Tours with High-Volume Content
Hi Gary, I'm Alexandra. I'm the founder of Who is Amsterdam Tours? We create storytelling-based walking tours around real human connection in Amsterdam. So we bring locals into the tours.
That's cool.
That's pure magic. hundred percent it's hundred percent offline and hundred percent connection. rated people always tell me I wish that would be in other cities too. So I have a strong team, I have a strong product. My challenge is that I'm the bottleneck. I'm handling marketing, sales, operations
And I'm still relying heavily on platforms like Viadr and Airbnb. So my goal is actually to build a stronger brand, create more direct bookings and also take this concept internationally. So my question to you is I know content is key. What if your goal would be to create more direct bookings, what would you focus on?
Next.
Yeah.
Content. And any specific channel? Yeah, let's talk about it. So correct me if I'm wrong, you want to reach me when I'm going to Amsterdam on vacation to book an authentic tour with you, yes?
Exactly.
Great. Uh how much content does your company put out now? And I assume your biggest markets are Europe and America, yes?
Yes, English speaking um
Uh how much content does the company put out now? A day, a week, a month?
It has been very inconsistent, so maybe three times a week.
Three three times a week. So you're saying right now, at this point, you think that you're putting out three posts a week. Yes?
Uh yeah, well more stories, yeah. But it has been very inconsistent.
I see. Not posts. You're putting it into one Instagram account in stories, not in the main feed. How many main feed, like what is your how many platforms are you on?
So uh Instagram at this
And what's what's the name of the Instagram?
Who is Amsterdam tours?
Um how do you spell Amsterdam since I can't spell A
A-M-S-E-R-D-A-M Who is Amsterdam?
Thank you. Okay. This is making me laugh very much. Alex, you're a very funny girl. There's three posts that have happened in the last week, but prior to that, the last post prior to that was September 30th. Alex knew exactly where she was coming. She didn't like to this moment is making me smile. Alright, so couple things. You're not very far. Like the first thing that I'm excited about is the you clearly do not post anywhere close enough to the ambition you have. But the content you're making
A good start. Like normally when someone's not posting often, even what they're posting is a disaster. Your content is good because your product is good for content. Right? Yeah. So couple things. You if you want to be off of the drug Of Airbnb and V Row and all that, right? If you wanna be off that drug.
Absolutely, yeah.
You must post on eight platforms a day, twice a day. You you must post sixteen pieces of content Every day. Now, you're a small company, one woman show. I'm okay if you take the same video with the same copy and post it on YouTube Shorts, Twitter, Facebook. Threads. LinkedIn. I'm okay with that. I prefer over time you do what I do, which is it's slightly different, different copy, different first three seconds, all the stuff I talk about.
James or Andre uh will put in Gary V dot com slash attention in the thread right now. It's a 35 page deck I made to teach you how to do it even better. But if you want to get off the drug You need to post thirty six pieces of content a day. you know okay like you you need to post fifty content a day we're gonna start with sixteen two original videos on eight platforms twice a day
What you're gonna do then is Hey everybody uh hope you're enjoying the podcast right now. Make sure you follow the podcast. That's why I'm interrupting. Let's keep going on this show, but follow the podcast. It'll make my mom super happy. When Something actually gets a lot of views. Like, you know, right now you're not you're not gonna get a lot of views, but something is gonna hit eventually. What do you know what the most views you've ever gotten on one of these videos is?
Oh I think uh in the past it was like ten thousand views.
You're gonna take that ten thousand view when something this is advice for everyone. When a piece of content gets a hundred thousand views the first time. You're gonna then take that piece of content and you're gonna run advertising on Facebook and Instagram and on TikTok. to people that live in New York and Los Angeles and high net worth London, high net worth zip codes in America and Europe. who have a higher likelihood of being able to afford your tour.
Right. Okay. I just I just feel like that the the content which is hitting it's more generic but my brand is not a like a generic brand. It's really about human content.
You're talking about overall.
Yeah, like so that the content I made which which was working and was more generic, like pretty pictures of Amsterdam, but that's not my brand. My brand
I I like what you're doing. You don't need to d like to your at some level I'm okay with both because if someone discovers you from a pretty picture, it might not be the worst thing and if it's very easy for you to do, I'm happy with that. Cause don't forget, it's not or, it's and.
Right. Yeah, okay.
You understand? Yeah. Like
I I do understand and I I just feel like because Uh always having humans and interviews in it is just very work.
I like that. I like that. The problem is you have no choice.
Right. Okay.
Thank you so much, Gary.
I'm gonna move in a second, I see Vince, but I I really wanna make this last point. If you don't do what I'm saying You'll never be known, you'll always have to be reliant on them.
Yeah, it's very clear.
And and I need and I need everyone to understand this. I need everyone to understand this. Like The number one job everyone has here is to make social media content. There is no number one above it. Whatever you're doing for 8, 10, 12, 15 hours a day at work, the number one job is the content. You know, and if you've got the money to hire another person to help you with it, you do that. And if you don't have the money, it makes your hours have to prioritize it.
Thank you, Gary.
You got it.
¶ YouTube Shorts for Google Gemini
Gary, good to see you again.
Uh.
Two years ago, James and I went to high school and college together. So I think I was part of the 4D
Program, brother.
And uh I started off so I was an executive at Microsoft, had a great career of Helping or organizations transform top sales, top partner leader, top executive at Microsoft. Left in tw in uh 2016. Started a podcast when nobody else was doing it. I was listening I was reading your books. Didn't know James was working for you at the time in fact, which is funny. And um that took off.
Over the last few years what's happened is people were like, we want to be in person again, right? This is what we're seeing now with AI, this community thing. So at the end of COVID, or towards the end of COVID, we started hosting events. So I quickly grew to a media events and now community.
And so that sort of ultimate partner brand, I'm the CEO of Ultimate Partner, we've got like five employees, we're scaling and growing. We tripled uh sales in two years, we doubled last year, we're planning on doubling again this year. Um and we're hosting five events this year, in fact. In fact my next event is in Bellevue, Washington.
We're we're past two million this year. We'll be past two million. We're looking at some outside investment uh potentially. I don't want to dilute the company too but that but I have a publicly traded technology company that wants to support us. We are expert in the world of hyperscaler ecosystem partners, working with other partners, trying to work with Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and driving great results. Of course, the AI conversation is in everything. We talk about tectonic ships.
and shifting the conversations because it's changing so rapidly today. So people want to come not just once a year, they want to come multiple times a year. There's a lot of value in the room and these people want to come, they come back multiple times. I've kind of been called the Kevin Bacon in our space because I get a lot of these top executives from Microsoft and Amazon and because they've all worked.
I got it. Of course.
And they love to come on stage. We we record everything, we turn it into podcast content, we turn it into social content. I'm really good about using LinkedIn because I'm a B to B b brand in terms of and I'll occasionally use Facebook and Instagram and TikTok.
Where where are you on YouTube short?
Uh we're use w I'm using YouTube shorts for all the podcasts.
episodes. I need every I need every I need everyone to hear this. Everybody here needs to bring YouTube shorts to the top of their priority platforms because Gemini which is you you know, Google's AI engine is highly valuing content that comes from shorts and YouTube in the results. And so if you want you or your business to show up when someone asks a question to Gemini, which is what they're gonna do instead of going to Google search.
The content I I like for example, for Vince, he should literally go back home now and make sure every piece of content he's ever put out on LinkedIn in video form should be on YouTube Shorts. All of it. Keep going.
¶ Maximizing Business Exit Value
Good. Yeah, and we have a YouTube channel, we're using it, but uh I I hear it loud and clear, more and more. Um so a couple of things. We wanna scale my my goal is to scale this thing to a hundred million dollar valuation in the next two and a half years. get the ten million and get get a valuation. We we have a couple potential outcomes. Uh we think maybe another technology company would want to take our community and use it to help promote their brand and their and scale their business more.
Uh one of those companies is in New Jersey in fact. So one one of the questions is how do I get there? How do I work backward from that?
Well if you mean to it from from an e from an exit?
To tags it. How do I think backwards from that? There's some there's some limitate limiting factors, and I'll kind of build in here a second because maybe it'll help shape the answer in a way. One is I was hit by a car last year riding my bicycle, I was almost taken out completely.
Uh so I really recognize like being the founder and being the voice and being the the glue that holds this together is tough. How do I think about How do I think about bringing the right people in the r in in the community to support that so it's not just me?
And then how do I think about doubling the events and potentially also growing the community aspect? Because people want to be in person. They love that aspect of rubbing elbows with these executives, getting them to know each other, building their businesses together. But they don't love going to like circle on some of these platforms. Like they're These are pe these are sellers, these are entrepreneurs, and they like the in person.
So Yeah, Vince, I'll be honest with you, like I think the answer to your question is more. Okay. Um, and what I mean by that is if I round up everything you've said. Everything's going in the right direction. You need to ta you need to make you need to make sure the business uh I'm so glad you're so close with James. James will tell you, because he got to see it up close and personal, like I did not try to maximize profit. When you're growing
You're investing. You know, if you want this, it's just more. You need three or four more executives. that matter, right? Which I have a lot of confidence you have the ability to hire two or three or four people, you know, whatever needs you have. That will allow you to have a lot more events. It will allow you to make a lot more content and it will allow you to have more time to have more meetings with people that eventually could become acquirers.
just on good old fashioned biz dev, let's get some dinner and get to know each other, more outreaching to people that are prospective buyers where you're not even doing the sales, you're priming You know? You're priming those people. You know? I love it. You know, like like it's just it's it's yours is a fun one. It's it's just don't make any money.
Yeah. Just then plow it all back in, which is fine.
Yeah. If you're, you know, you, who owns the business?
I own it one hundred percent. I have my son working for me. It's mostly contract hours, but it's
Understood. And and and if I may, what's the top line revenue?
Top line is two will be 2.2 this year.
Yeah. So so basically like Like you can't make any profit on that. I don't know where you need money wise to live your lifestyle. You need to if you wanna really exit for a real number, you need to live a more humble lifestyle. Use your Microsoft stock or you know, like truly like have you everything that's at your disposal must be talked about because all of the money needs to go back into business because you need to hire and create more output and create more smoke for the acquisition.
Okay. That's good to know. I plowed a hundred thousand back in already this year just
You mean personal.
Yeah, wanting to do your personal money.
Okay, great. So that means that in in what you did last year, you weren't even able to make enough you didn't make a lot of profit. Even so much great. So you're you're in the right might mental place. Now so if that's the case, the next step is Where all that money i is it being used the most efficiently? Yes. Right? When I hear you did one point what last year?
One point two.
Right. So if you did 1.2 where you also didn't like and you didn't make six hundred thousand in profit, now it goes line by line by line by line of every single cent where it went and we gotta re-jigger it. to create the more of more events, more you know, for example, you need to hire someone to do biz dev on locations to get all your locations for free.
Yeah, yeah.
Right? Like the first thing, you know, James also knows this. Like, I love a good barter. You know, like you know, like like it just makes sense. There's so many physical locations that would just love for humans to fucking show up. So if you had somebody full time just looking for places that were willing to give us the space for free because they just want ninety humans in the building buying pretzels and fucking sodas, I don't know. That's a great idea.
We're using a top hotel dish for this next one. It's costing me a fortune.
Bad. If you had somebody full time DMing every hotel, every venue, a bowling alley, I don't fucking know. A zoo. Where are you where are you physically?
I I'm in Jupiter, Florida.
Yeah, I know that. I mean the reason I just said, ugh, is you can do outdoor shit. Yeah. Like no, you should never pay for a venue again. You're bringing high value people. They should pay you.
We do some uh some i events at the podcast studio which is in
Okay. But no more no more fancy hotel ever again. Too much cogs. All right. Tiff.
Thank you.
¶ Building Offline Community with Content
Hi Gary, good to see you.
Yeah. Great to see you.
Uh so we met several times through my corporate role uh where I was a client of Boehner X. This is not about
I figured.
I just started a passion project called The Threat Experience. It's a small invite-only in-person set of events where I connect strangers and build community, starting here in Philadelphia.
Philadelphia.
So each group of eight to ten people is curated around one thing that they have in common that I know. And through storytelling with a special guest, the last three have had celebrity chefs. Um so and folks are learning how to make something together. They're enjoying an amazing meal around the table. And the goal
Can I can I can I'll cover it?
what that common thread is.
Tip, right one one thing right off the bat. Yeah, for sure. On your content, make it more real, less production. Okay. I'm just looking at it right now and like you have such like I'm in love with what a lot of you are t like my favorite businesses to invest in right now and look at and want to build is analog, non-digital. I love what I'm hearing in the themes here. Big shout out to everybody at Vive. Like you're all going there. Like I love this. This is so good.
So, but like when you have an event, right? It has to be filmed. It has to be filmed. Get an intern. Somebody's filming at all times. I mean, somebody's gotta be filming at all times. Right? You it it needs to be filmed. And when you d how long was that cooking event?
The second portion was twenty minutes of a three hour.
event. That three-hour event needed to be 47 pieces of content that you posted on social. On that. Got it? Yes. Has to happen and it has to be real. This is too polished what I'm seeing from you right now. Gotcha. Because you're doing authentic shit.
Yeah. I mean that's one of the questions I had for you is this whole experience is intentionally offline. It's phone free.
I love it.
address the irony of capturing photos and video because it'll there's a lot of people in the production of this. Um
They're you know
Building a social media presence.
I don't I don't I don't think yeah, I don't think they're in conflict. I think for the me, I'm coming, I'm phone free. You're filming for marketing your business. It's not bothering me as long as I'm in a place where I either upfront know that's the case or you're asking if I can use. me in a clip where I'm l giggling because I made powdered sugar for the first time. What however you want to address that, as long as you're being authentic, I do not think it's in conflict. I think that's uh
Yeah, I think that is uh if someone thinks it's in conflict, I think they're being very uh intellectually immature, right? I think you're I think that it is not in conflict. My experience is To be phone-free and do something physical like and meet a stranger. I I I think you have a brilliant I think this is a brilliant business model for many people on earth. I think many people on earth.
that make between$150,000 and$350,000 a year should build the exact business you're building. Be the curator of strangers meeting each other in real life phone free and doing an activity. Because we need more platforms to create community and people are yearning for it whether they understand it or not. And then the brilliance is, in the way I think about things, is you get to film the entire thing. It's a production day. It's literally two interns.
from the University of Pennsylvania or like kids that can film it. I'm not kidding. And then with AI you could just chop up the content and then you put it everywhere locally and then it goes from thirty people to ninety people to four hundred people and you got a business. Amazing. And it feels good. It feels good to bring people together, you know?
It definitely does. That's why I wanted to do it in the first place.
I'm proud of you but but you've got much for me. I'm proud of you, but the marketing of it needs a real twist, change. Okay.
Got it. I'm on it. Thank you.
¶ Skincare Launch & Content Strategy
Hi Gary.
Bye. Bye.
Um real quick, uh Donna Caruso, I'm building the the skincare line uh off of our spa and uh two things I'm thinking about to help with the launch. I want to have events or activations at sporting events. Because they're uh women uh there's usually nothing there for women. So golf tennis F one is kind of what I'm focusing on.
Smart.
And uh so your thoughts on that and then what roles we're we're just in the very beginning, pre revenue, all that kind of stuff, we're just getting product product produced now. What roles should we be actively looking at filling?
So start from the top, the skincare, you're gonna sell it. Correct. Direct to consumer?
Yes.
Only at first?
That was the thought, yes.
That is the right thought. Um uh Shopify?
Doing it now.
Live shopping.
TikTok Live?
Yes. Do you know what TikTok affiliate is when you send samples to people and they make content?
Yes, we're we're creating those bundles now.
Alright, you just need people supporting that and people supporting making content. What do I think about sporting events? I think that, correct me if I'm wrong, you plan on showing up to events and giving people samples?
Uh that and having an activation station, so like a like a woman's relaxation lounge or something, so they could come in.
I would say that I don't like that because I think it's too expensive and distracting from zero to five. That's what more mature companies do when they're doing ten to fifty.
Okay.
Right? Like like let's play it out. All the effort for you to show up at a tennis tournament as big as Indian Wells or as local as Cincinnati or what have you to have a relaxation like I think you're bleeding ideology into business strategy. Let's play it out. You have a lounge with masseuses and like like a like like like the the like what Shell Zalis does, you know, girl you know the the female quotient, like you're a small tiny brand that has no revenue.
Right. You're gonna spend time, energy, resources on putting a lounge for for, you know, foot massages and s hair blow drying at a tent I mean, I think that's beautiful and I love it. The problem is you're not gonna sell a lot of product'cause of it. Nothing.
I don't even care about selling in the beginning, I just need brand exp.
Yes, so maybe you'll get more brand exposure by one video on TikTok getting forty thousand views than if you show up to every fucking golf, tennis, and and Formula One event in the country.
Okay. So maybe not.
I love by the way, I love activations. And if you said just sampling, I'd say yes, as long as you're filming it and if someone reacts positively, that's the clip. But but you're bringing a hundred million dollar brand marketing strategy to the table when you have zero revenue. Doing activations at events the way you're describing them is what bigger companies should be doing, not smaller companies.
So I can start with just sampling and that would be
Yeah good.
Yeah, that I like if you use it as a production day for content. Just sampling I don't love. I mean I love, but I don't love it as much as sampling with a camera. And hoping that Avery P that's on the call here freaks out when she uses your thing and that's the video that gets 1.7 million views on TikTok.
Okay, very good. Appreciate it.
Thank you, Gary. No you gotta
You gotta jump. Love you all. Hope it helped. Thank you. Take care everyone. That was huge.
Huge, huge, huge.
Hey everybody, if you enjoyed this podcast, please go back and look at the prior episodes. They're loaded. I appreciate your attention and uh thanks for being part of this journey.