How Gary Vaynerchuk Turned a Video Series Into a Popular Book

Do you use videos to enhance your brand?

Want to find ways to grow your business?

To discover how he created a video series that exploded his personal brand and his business, I interview Gary Vaynerchuk.
More About This Show
The Social Media Marketing podcast is an on-demand talk radio show from Social Media Examiner. It's designed to help busy marketers and business owners discover what works with social media marketing.

In this episode I interview Gary Vaynerchuk, CEO of VaynerMedia, host of the #AskGaryVee Show and author of Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook. His brand-new book is called #AskGaryVee: One Entrepreneur's Take on Leadership, Social Media, and Self-Awareness.

Gary will explore how he created a video show that became an audio podcast and a book.

You'll discover Gary's thoughts on what's hot in social.

Share your feedback, read the show notes and get the links mentioned in this episode below.
Listen Now
You can also subscribe via iTunes, RSS, or Stitcher.

Here are some of the things you'll discover in this show:
How Gary Vaynerchuk Turned a Video Series Into a Popular Book
Gary's big dreams

Gary recalls that from a business and entrepreneurial standpoint, he's always dreamed big. At 14 years old, he started working for his dad bagging ice for $2 an hour and by his third day on the job was plotting how to open 4,000 wine stores.

Although a lot of people think Wine Library TV grew his business, Gary clarifies that he'd been in business for over a decade and built a $50 million+ operation before he started Wine Library TV and talking about marketing.

Gary launched Wine Library TV on February 1, 2006, which was less than a year after YouTube had been created. He says that while the show didn't really pop until the summer of 2007, he felt there were enough comments to make it worthwhile. He notes that Ze Frank and Rocketboom were also making some noise around the same time.

Gary's patience paid off and when he ended up on the Conan O'Brien Show, Lifehacker, TechCrunch, and Diggnation, everything exploded.

Listen to the show to discover how and when Gary discovered he was good at being a personality.

The start of #AskGaryVee

During the summer of 2014, D Rock (David Rock) emailed Gary, asking to make a film about him. Gary agreed and before the film even aired, Gary asked David to work for him full time doing video content.

Then on a random day a year and a half ago, Gary invited David and Steve Unwin from his editorial team into his office to shoot the first episode of #AskGaryVee, in which Gary answered random questions people asked him on Twitter.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76d0lQiCqNI

When asked how the format for the show came about, Gary shares that he felt his keynotes were stagnating because he was telling the same story over and over. To get out of that rut, he started pushing event organizers to let him add a Q&A component to his presentations. For example, during a 45-minute keynote, he would do 30 minutes of speech and 15 minutes of Q&A.

Gary believes his ability to answer any question about business, social media, technology, or branding off the cuff is what separates him from other speakers.

Gary realized he didn't need to travel to answer questions and he could use the video show to deliver something he was really good at. Then, he made the decision to use it to get to the point where his keynote speeches were solely Q&A sessions.

Gary explains that the format for #AskGaryVee is simple. They go into an all-glass conference room at VaynerMedia, Gary sits down in front of the camera, and India asks him five questions that come from social media (Snapchat, Instagram, Facebook), which Gary answers in one take. Any edited spots, which are rare, go to black and white so they're clearly recognizable.

In addition to #AskGaryVee, Gary recently started #DailyVee, which is a day-in-the-life vlog that gets edited into episodes to help entrep...