126. The Social Media Wake-Up Call for Real Estate Agents With Gary Vaynerchuk

I will say right now if you're a modern real estate agent, more than 50% of your time is to make content. Because it will work. I posted 397 pieces of content yesterday. The world's attention is in mobile devices and on these 7-12 platforms. That is an opportunity to sell homes. One piece of content changes the course of your career. Every single real estate agent listening to this podcast, what I can tell you is. Gang, what is Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, Uber and Coinbase all have in common? An angel investor, a guy by the name of Gary Vanerchuk. Friends, if you've been living under the proverbial rock for the last 20 years, you might not know who he is. By the way, if you don't, I'm not talking to you. If you know, you know. Gary V. is synonymous with all things social media. He runs a media empire and we sat down with him. Gang, he is going to tell you exactly why and how to use social media to literally change your business. He's going to give it to you straight. He doesn't sugarcoat anything, but he's got a giant heart. We've become buddies and I can tell you this. By the end of this podcast, the way you think about social media will change. Sit back and buckle up. This is Gary V. Gary, yes sir. We have real estate agents listening far and wide. And they're bombing down the road in their rain drovers. They're doing 80 miles an hour. And they want to know when they're driving rovers, I mean like they're already doing solid. I think as soon as you get real estate, you get a rain drover. And now you have to work to pay for it. Got it. And they're all wondering the same thing and we pulled. And here's what they told us. They said they're making more social media posts than ever. Yes. More than five a week on average, but they're getting less leads and less attraction from the marketing they're doing. What are they doing wrong? Well, I just laughed inside my own head when you said five a week. Wow. So how about that, everyone? That is a true statement. How do you do that? You really fall into the framework of PNH, which is something I'm going to start pushing more and more, which is platforms and handles. Platforms is I'm on seven to eight platforms. Nine with sub-stack now. I have multiple handles. There's a post that got half a million views yesterday called Uncle V, which is I'm the uncle of the kids on TikTok and the content I put out is more Uncle, not friend or dad or leader. And so I'm very impressed and empathetic to the people riding the rovers who think five posts a week is a lot. That would be like me saying for everyone who's in shape physically, that would be me starting this interview saying, "Hey, brother, so my people, I just pulled them. They did three push-ups last week." Who's someone gave you my workout routine? This must have been our producer. I'm going to get on this. And I don't mean three sets. And I don't mean three days of a hundred push-ups. I mean three push-ups. Five pieces of social media content in 2026 in a week is equivalent to three total push-ups for the week. So is it a quantity game? It is a quantity and quality game. Quantity is not subjective. Quality is, right? So everyone here on the other side listening to this podcast is debating quality. They're also, you know what they all just said? They're like, "Gary, what are you talking about? My job is to sell houses. I've got to be at open houses. I have a team to manage. I don't have all this time to make content. My response is tough. If you want it, if you want to sell homes, there's a lot of people listening now that got to the rover from a Toyota, no Disantoyota, because they did not on a thousand doors, because they did send direct mail. You know that foundation of the grind of real estate of the 80s, 90s, and early 2000s, that new foundation is called social media content. But unlike direct mail, one piece of content for some unknown reason, and I know why they can go into it. But it gets three million views instead of your normal 1300, changes the course of your career. There's no door you could have knocked on, no flyer you could have sent to mail, or no phone call you could have made from 1970 to 2005, that would have compounded your business 50x. But there is a social media post that can do that. Everyone knows that I'm literally getting, you see this? I know that everyone who just heard that knows I'm right, knows it's possible. Doesn't mean they know how, doesn't mean that they think it will, but they know it's true, and it's not a lottery ticket. I think it's very manageable. I've devoted my career to being good at the craft. It's no different than staging a home. Is staging a home a skill? Or are you lucky? It's a skill. You know how to make the couch and the carpet and all the shit? Well, making social media content is a skill. I know, and I'll do it right now, that I can say go to GaryBE.com/attention, and I put out a 50-page deck from my last book day trading attention. That is free. No excuses, especially if you have a rover. You can afford a $30 book, but even if you don't want to, there it is. It's GaryBE.com/attention. I know every day at @GaryVee, I put out content of how to do this well. I also know that I tell people over and over, don't listen to what I'm saying, watch what I'm doing. But I also know that yesterday, when I landed in Atlanta for this amazing keynote, and thank you for having me. I ate some gummy bears in my hotel room, and I wasn't supposed to do that. And that's called "Lack of Discipline." They are delicious, though. And Mike LeConte, I hope you're not listening, but my trainer would be pissed if I told him the truth this morning that I ate 40 gummy bears for no reason. And oh, by the way, they probably cost me 80 bucks, because you know how to-- - Get him a disco toe. - This was what I did. -. to tell you exactly. And that's basically the punchline. I am incredibly, unbelievably, uncannily disciplined when it comes to business. I am not that psycho-dominator when it comes to health and wellness. I've become much better. You can look at my old videos versus now. I've gotten the results. But the wow-wow from all the real estate agents and everybody else, I'm like, well, it used to be, well, guess what? Used to buy beachfront property in Malibu for a lot less 40 years ago, too. The supply and demand of attention. I actually think of social media like real estate. - Is that right? - I think of attention as an asset, real estate asset. - Sure. - And the reason I've been so good is I'm good at finding new neighborhoods or new states or new countries. Like, when I was yelling at everybody in 2018 for TikTok, that was buying beachfront property in Costa Rica 40 years ago. I was right. How many of you actually did something about it? - Very few. - Correct. And the ones that did are the ones that say something on stage when she opens for you guys today. Or the thousands of DMs I get many do. 99% don't. I can't sit on this podcast and make you do something. But what I can tell you is if you're driving right now, walking your dog on the treadmill, I know how everybody listens to podcasts. And you don't realize that the world's attention is in mobile devices and on these seven to 12 platforms. And that is an opportunity to sell homes. Well, I don't know what to do for you. The end. I could literally leave now. I might even leave now. - We're going to try to give you for a few more questions. So if I do wake up tomorrow morning, and I hear this and I get it and I go make my profiles on these seven sites and I start posting, is there a specific type of content that I need to be putting out there? Because more often than not, we hear that real estate agents are making posts after post. The number of likes and interactions are going down. They're not sure if anyone's listening. They're not being shared. - Of course. When you make content that selfish, you're not going to get as many views. My sister's a real estate agent. Please find her Liz Navello. You should refer her or whatever. Give her some actions. - Where is she an agent? She's in Jersey. - Okay. Everybody go find Liz Navello. - Liz Navello. I think she's got a Liz Navello Vaynerchuk just so she gets more views. So you could find her. I'm sure. What would you tell her if she was sitting here? How would you coach her? I spoke to her yesterday about this. She's a real estate agent that's also a full-time mom and she's going through her life, right? But what I told her and what I'll tell everybody right now is you have to make content. We all understand that. But the reality is that if you're making content that's in your self-interest, you will lose. I believe all 11,000 people I'm about to talk to are in their own self-interest every time they post. - Wow. With all due respect. Please buy this home from me. Please connect with me and let's refer with each other. So I make money. So I make money. So I make money. So I make money. How the fuck do you think this is going to work if every post out of your mouth is buy this shit from me for me for me? How about making a piece of content about the school system? In the area you, how about you talk about the values of the park? Review the park in your town that might be a gateway drug to someone being interested in your town. Now you brought them value. Now you might be the right person. And I've said this at real estate conventions for a trillion years. Become the mayor of your town. Become the PR agent of your town on social. Tell people why they should move to your town. School district, the park. In Springfield, Melbourne, New Jersey, Short Hills, you should talk about the wine library, my family business. It's one of the best wine stores in the country. Some people might literally move because they like wine that much to that general area. How about teaching other people how to be a real estate agent? How about my sister making content about balancing being a real estate agent and a mother? That would be wildly approachable. That would be incredibly valuable for a mom half the room I'm going to talk to right now is trying to balance that. It's incredibly challenging. I'm very empathetic to it. It's an incredibly difficult game to navigate. You feel guilty on both sides of the equation. That makes you connect with the audience on the other side. And who knows? All of a sudden, I like Sally. I like Liz Navello. I like George. room for connecting with me. How about talking about the New York Jets or cooking or hiking? How about becoming a human being that other people are intrigued by? And then because they like you, you know, like in real life. How about the real estate industry knows this? The fuck are you doing at the PTA? You're at the PTA not because you love the PTA. You're there to connect with people that happen to then want to sell their home. And they happen to then want to use you. How about you show up like that on social instead of wearing a suit and try to look the part even though you've never sold a fucking home in your life. There's a big shout out for 23 year old dudes dressing the part doesn't mean you are the part. It's going to hit good with this. I think that's going to land. No, that one's good. Because it's true. What else is going to land? Not as nice with this audience of your crew that listen to this podcast is no one gives a shit that you're the queen of the town and you've been doing it for 25 years. They do give a shit but not on social and that emerging talent and that emerging consumer base is coming up. And I know every 53 year old that has dominated their 20 mile radius for the last 15 years. It's still using it. It's pissed right now that there's some 24 year old that just sold a house and they don't understand how that happened and the answer is social. Right. And so it's coming from every angle. The battleground in real estate is clearly playing out on social clearly. AI is looming. We had a lot of questions about that. Are we going to be replaced by AI? How do I use AI in my business? Do I have to be leading with it? Look, AI is the biggest technology shift in our society since the internet. It's a very big deal. And I will tell you right now is a human being. I'm in Atlanta right now and I've rips needed a house and I had a buy-em-one. I'm going to Chachi B.T. and saying who's the best real estate agent in Atlanta and whatever shows up shows up. That's it. And so what are we talking about? This industry knows how profoundly game-changing Google was. Let there be no confusion. Zillow was built on top of Google. Right? Compass was built on top. Keller's exploded. I watched it. I was there early on SEO and SEM. AI is massive. How do you show up on the results for an AI search? You may content. Got it. The end. Wow. And you have to then do everything else in the 49%. 50%. Yep. Would you lean towards a type of content? Is it video? Is it making the static posts? Is it certain platforms? Where would you tell us to start? Yes. All aboard. Yes, sir. You know, for me, I'm not a good writer. So what I do is I make videos, but then it's transcribed into written form. I do that with a team. Today if you don't have a team, you could do it with AI. You know, sub-stack. I brought it up once again. So we're doing a sub-stack around your Essex County, New Jersey. I'll just keep sticking to Jersey. If you do the Essex County real estate sub-stack and you're just, you're a great writer. You like, look, I don't like to write. I like to make videos. I like to do podcasts. It comes natural. Do you know how many people want or enjoy sitting down on a Saturday afternoon with a glass of wine or a bourbon or a sparkling water or tea and just writing four or five paragraphs about what happened in town? There's a lot of people that can do that who are petrified to be on camera. And it's sub-stack and writing that is going to lead them to selling a lot more homes. It's all out there. Everyone listening knows, but they don't want to do video content for social. They were good at door knocking, but they don't want to do sub-stack or LinkedIn. They all know it's true. The question becomes, are you going to be 38-year-old Gary? 38-year-old Gary knew eating like shit, not sleeping a lot, and never going to the gym was not going to work out. And he decided that he just had to break it. And it didn't come natural to him. So it took him all of 38 years to start the process. And this morning when I went to the gym, this morning, I did not want to go. We didn't get in until 12.45 in the morning. I had this whole day. I had to fly to London after this. I did not want to go to the gym this morning. I literally wanted to get punched in the fucking mouth more than going to the gym this morning. I'm not kidding when I say that, but you went, but I went. Why? Because I don't want to die earlier than I can. And if you want to sell a house more than you did yesterday, I highly recommend getting off your fucking high horse and looking for the excuse and being like, oh, I used to get views. Like, this doesn't work. Do you know what one dimensional real estate agents are? They're just on Instagram. That's right. And a little bit of fucking TikTok. You mentioned that there's all these different platforms. Every single real estate agent listening to this podcast must daily post on Facebook, Blue Classic, okay? YouTube shorts. Okay. Very important YouTube shorts because Gemini is going to be one of the biggest AI agents and it's getting its content from YouTube shorts. Instagram. TikTok. Twitter X. Growing day by day in content. And I don't want to hear like, well, it's political and I hate it there. People buy houses from Twitter. This one's got to really stun a lot of you. Snapchat spotlight. Really? Snapchat has its own TikTok Instagram version. It's called spotlight. No one's marketing on it. It's crowded with 25 to 35 year olds. If you have a market where you do rentals to that crew, post college, young families, no one's there. So you're going to stand out. You can post the same damn video you posted on YouTube. We'll get to that in a minute. I'll get to that in a minute. LinkedIn. A monster. If you're top 5% agent listening right now, rich people who are professionals are on LinkedIn. And when they're going through their feed, looking for SaaS business and sales tips and my content, they also might be moving to the suburbs of Chicago. And if you're a highland park real estate person, you start with like, are you moving to a highland park? I might be moving to a highland park. And then there's Substack, which I'm obsessed with. I think it's becoming more like Twitter and Instagram. There's Behi for B2B. If people on the commercial side, I know this is probably, no, we have a decent commercial audience. So commercial real estate agents, I know you think none of this is for you. Between YouTube shorts to show up on AI, because I could tell you I did that search for VaynerMedia. I did the search looking for real estate people recently for an office in London and an office in LA. AI. You would have showed up if you made content. So commercial has to be on YouTube shorts, LinkedIn and Substack or Behive has to happen. Okay. These become the platform some obsessed with. Now the rules of posting, because you mentioned it, you alluded to it. Can I make one video and put it everywhere or do I have to make unique content for each platform? You can make one, but I would change the copy and maybe the hook and a little bit of just a little tweaking. Right. Because the LinkedIn crowd is different than the Snapchat crowd and you want to be contextual to the room you're in. Sure. Right. I'm doing this podcast. I'm talking about real estate. I'm making a contextual. I'm talking about staging a house. I don't bring that up in a construction industry or a dentist industry. No, they couldn't follow something that's sophisticated. We understand this. So that's where my brother and by the way, if you don't have time, stop taking money out of your firm and start hiring people to help you do social. That was where I want to go next because you've grown a giant online marketing company. Yes. I mean, hundreds and hundreds of companies from all over the world hire you all. Yeah. We went from zero or two me and my brother to almost 3,000 employees in the last 13 years. It's staggering to even talk about. And a lot of our listeners are running brokerages in the running Lord's teams from a leadership perspective. How do you make sure that everyone in a company of that size understands the vision and how do you execute on all these plans? I want you to title this podcast. Selfless is greater than selfish. How do I grow? I actually care about what they care about. This industry is so sales driven, so money driven, which I don't mind at all. I'm a pure capitalist entrepreneur all the way through. But of course some of your best people are leaving your team because you're a. Cuts your right to it, friends. Let's go to the punchline. Like why would somebody want to hustle for you and not go somewhere else if you do not have humanity if you do not care about their bank account as well? If you don't care about their life, like I'm supposed to be filmed right now by someone on my team. Something happened in his life last night. We landed. There's a big trip. We got this. I got this interview. I got this keynote. I got to go to London. Sure. And I sent him home. I love that. And he didn't even. It didn't even cross his mind that he could ask. I just saw his face look up when we got off the plane last night. That's called humanity. That's called being a human being. I think this industry could use a lot more of. I love that. How do I lead? Why do I have stick. Not only do I have 3,000 employees, I just texted Haley Grant this morning. I texted Haley Grant this morning. This is real. It's 10/8. You know, it's Sunday. Yeah. Where's my phone? I want you to. You know, no, no, I know you believe me, but I want you to look because it matters to me. Here it is. Haley Grant. You can read what I wrote. It's very simple. Happy 10. That's it. I texted Happy 10. She's been here 10 years. You're wishing her a happy business anniversary? Yes. What time was that? 10.30 4am. A 10.30 4am on a Sunday. And what did she write back? Thank you, gee. Let's make it the best year yet. This is called humanity. She's big on the emojis. Yeah, she had some emojis. But to me, why did I bring that up? Friends, all behind the cameras. How long did that actually take? First it took me the minute to read. First I had to care enough to have an admin team that is giving me universities and birthdays every morning. First I had to care. Intent. First I had to fucking care. Sure. Next I had to take. 0.3 seconds to text happy 10. Do you think Haley appreciated that? I sure do. - I think they meant the world tour. - Yeah, and by the way, we're so close that it didn't mean the world tour because I interact with my people so much. It's not like left field. You know, like I'm in it with my people. Be a human being. I'm stunned by these leaders that start these brokerage that think they're special. Do you think I give a **** that you sold $4,700 in homes for $3.3 billion? What does that make you better than me? The audacity, like we need more humanity, we need more humility. Look, I have plenty of bravado and passion and conviction on this podcast right now. But that doesn't compromise the humility and humanity that I bring to leadership that has been the foundation of why I have everything. - That's why it grows. - That's why it grows, that's why I keep people. That's why no one will ever beat me 'cause I'm gonna out nice guy them. - I love it. Last question for us. You don't need to be here today. You've been incredibly successful. You get to pick and choose what you do. You've been a tremendous friend of the real estate. - Yes. - And I checked, I went all the way back. Even when you were teaching people about wine, you were talking about real estate. - Yeah, I like it. Number one, why have you been such a friend of the industry in number two? You've decided to come here and pour into agents today. And now you're pouring into agents across the globe. - Why do you do it? 'Cause I respect this crew. - For everybody's been listening. If you made it this far and you haven't hung up so far, all of this is coming from Jersey immigrant love. This whole, this was just a love letter to this industry. The last 20 minutes for me. It's just the way I communicate. And what I want people to hear. Because I think I'm gonna be able to break through to 33 people that most people can't break through because I'm not tricked by their facade. And I'm just giving it to them. And I want them to win. Newseller, besides Liz novello, I do not hear if anyone does anything I just said. - That's a sister. - That's just a reminder, Ruben. - Correct. Literally could care less. But I can't control it. Even with my own sister, I can't control her. She's so capable and she's gonna do her thing. And her and me and all of you, we go through waves. I actually want to say this 'cause this might bring value. I know a lot of you did have a good chapter with social content six months of this or one year of that. It's kind of like working out. I do the same. You go through like a year or two when you crush and you lose it for like 60 days and you're like, it's 'cause you get hurt and then you stop. And now that four weeks, yeah, that's right. You get dinged up or you know, like you start to compromise. You start making excuses or because it doesn't come natural, you feel like you did enough and now you can chill and vacation. You know, I'm here because I respect this industry in a lot of ways. For all of the shortcomings that I worry about in social content, people grind. People drop off their kids at school and then go to an open house and have three people show up in the middle of winter. People grind in this industry, right? And I respect the work ethic of the majority of the people in this industry. I think a lot of people go into this industry 'cause they think it's easy. And what I like about this industry is the industry spits those fuckers out fast, fast. You know, when the markets are red hot, a C-minus player can be good. You know, 72% of everyone that gets a license is out of the industry within 24 months of getting it. Makes sense to me. You know, and so for me, it's about the 28% that are listening right now. You know, that's what this is about. Or with the hope that one of the 72% that are listening right now and realize I'm talking real truth and we're gonna save them and make them part of the 28 and 72 in this podcast. I think this is an industry worth fighting for because I think a lot of people stand their own two feet. I think it's an incredible industry for people that try to balance the rest of their lives. I like industries that bring value to people who have this as their side hustle 'cause they are a full-time stay-at-home dad. Or look, this is also a sales-driven industry. I like sales even though I don't like when people go in for the kill in all their content. I like people to have a little foreplay with their content. A little romance. Like you can't just roll up to somebody at the bar and hand them your hotel key and think you're gonna convert unless you look like you and it's remarkable. But like, you know, like I think people need to be a little more strategic. I think people need to be more patient. I think people need to bring more value. But I'm never scared to ask for the sale. I'm building a Pokemon like Marvel Universe called VFriends. This is the notorious ninja hat, right? I want every person who has a kid that buys Pokemon to go to vfriends.com. VEE Friends.com. I want them to learn my world. I'm not scared to sell. I'm just scared to sell without giving value. And I would argue that 99% of the content coming from real estate is a cold start. Here's my open house. And I just, I think there's more to be done, more building up your personality. And I would say this should be fun for people. Your hobbies are your gateway drug to selling more homes. If you're into golf, more golf content mixed around your real estate content. Is that way it worked so well with wine? You were almost speaking poetry to wine drinkers when you were making those videos. Well, wine was very narrow. Later, now wine's good for me. When I throw a random wine post or wine review, it's good for me. Ironically, it's today the 22nd or first. 20s again. You're gonna be blown away. Yesterday was the 20th anniversary of my first episode of Wine Library TV. Is that right? I've been doing this for 20 years. I would have sent you a text. Happy anniversary, my friend. Thank you, brother. 20 years, I've been making content daily on the internet. And that's it. So when people are like, why didn't this happen? It's because you did three fucking pushups. That's it. Where can all of our people, you gave out two places, but I want your voice and our people's head as often as possible. Send them somewhere to get more of you. If you can't find me, you can suck. Well, sense. Thank you, sir. I will tell you, we've done over 200 episodes and no one is averse. That's the greatest answer ever. Gary, thank you for everything you're doing for real estate. Thank you, sir. Here's the question. Does Gary V stand for your greatness more than you stand for your limitations? The reason I ask is because he's not content with you living your best average life. He wants you to live your best life possible. He's like Gary Keller in that way. The guy has a giant heart. He literally believes every time he's speaking to you, he's protecting the industry and coaching you one on one. And sure, there's a lot of energy around just go do it. And I know that's difficult, but listen to what he's saying. He's saying that the number one thing around social media is consistency. When he lays out the seven platforms that he wants you on, he's fine if you post the same content slightly differently. So for each quote unquote piece of content you make, he multiplies it by seven because he's posting it in seven places. I know what you're thinking. Up to this point, the conventional wisdom has been pick one platform and go all in. What he's saying is different. He's saying that the consumer might pick one platform, but if you're actually trying to impact the most number of consumers, then you need to be on all of them. They each have their favorites. I'm not going to recap everything he said, but I'm going to leave you with this. Gary V believes that every single human here can maximize their potential as long as they just do the work. This begins with number one, making the commitment. Number two, having the plan and number three, doing the work. Go for it and do likewise. If you're enjoying this podcast, I want you to click the subscribe button. Anywhere that you get your podcasts, we want to be the voice in your head every single week. And every week we're dropping new content. We also send out a newsletter at the conclusion of every show to make sure that you get the highest points and the models and systems that were discussed. So if you want to sign up, I need your name and your email address. Head over to the millionaire agent podcast.com. Millionaire agent podcast.com. Enter your name and your email address in every week. That newsletter will be in your box. Friends, you just went on a journey. I hope that what happens between now and the next time we meet is absolutely wonderful for you. 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