I need everybody to hear this. The middle class will be in trouble.
Do you think it's our last chance to build wealth?
It has the chance to create hyper micro wealth, but I think a lot of people are going to check out of this era.
This is Gary Vaynerchuk, serial entrepreneur, best-selling author, and early investor in Facebook, Twitter, and Uber. He predicted TikTok, talking to computers, and the creator economy before anyone saw it coming. And in our lifetime's most unpredictable moment, I went straight to him for answers. What would you do if you have a laptop and AI?
I would build an app that's $5 to $50 a month, make unlimited organic content, and try to...
For me as a person in Silicon Valley, I can totally see how Anthropic releases new lines of code tomorrow and this business is done. Why would I start if it's already being automated?
Because everything you learn along the way will set up your next thing. What are you going to do? Lay down and cry? I'm asking you.
In Chicago, I was like, hold, I showed up. I didn't know, and they went, and I just battled and got through it. It was pretty cool.
Well, you do speak Russian, which is... I'm glad you... crazy. No. 3.
I actually want to talk about AI and what's happening. And you know, I've been watching you for eight years now. So I've been preparing for this interview for eight years, and what I noticed about you is that you're right on so many things. I remember you predicted TikTok, and you're the reason I started TikTok. I have three million followers there because you were like, you need to start TikTok. When you're looking at this AI era, do you think it's our last chance to build wealth right now?
That's a great question. You know, one of the things I try to do is when I talk about things publicly, I've spent a lot of time thinking it through. And I've seen indicators of actual human action that shows me an insight to the earliest preview of something I think will be at scale. So that's why a lot of my predictions have worked out. It's like when I talk about our grandkids marrying AI robots, well, it's already happening in Japan.
And so like to me, that's not a long putt. That's just something that's happening in a part of the world that clearly to me is a human psychology, and so it's going to work. Your question is interesting because my intuition is it has the chance to create hyper micro wealth. The fragmentation of, you know, vibe coding and all this stuff, and the stuff we're already seeing, right? Kids building out products very quickly and having success. On the flip side, you're also alluding to clearly the super scalers, right? When you look at what Meta and Microsoft and Google and Apple, like the biggest companies in China, like you could see a winner-takes-all scenario where 12 or 13 companies... My gut is that the economy and the consumer behavior is so large that yes, there'll be 25 companies that take so much, right? You look at, you know, Adobe and Salesforce and ServiceNow, SaaS companies. I mean, SaaS companies are clearly coming out of an incredible 30-year run and now walking into a potential buzzsaw.
You know, I saw a headline yesterday. I don't know if it's true. I mean, just, you know, I was busy yesterday, but X, maybe it was Claude. Claude just made, gave everybody a Bloomberg terminal for free. You know, like those kind of headlines seem very real to me. They seem really natural, but it's almost like Meta or Anthropic or someone else is going to eat up more Bloomberg and ServiceNow and Salesforce. Like it's like the battle of the titans.
Yeah. And then over here on the scraps, well, the scraps actually might be quite big, and it might be a social media-like era where all of us become, literally all of us become vibe coders. Like just like I thought one of my great predictions in 2008 was everybody would have a social media account when it did not seem like that.
Yeah. Is everyone going to have a mini app that is monetizable because they themselves were able to build it, not need a developer for 500,000?
I don't know. I think, I so I believe that the middle will be in trouble, and the middle might be a VaynerMedia, you know. But I have a feeling the separation of the middle class of entrepreneurship could be real. The difference is the long tail could be quite at scale, maybe even then creating this middle, you know, this middle class. I don't know. If you put a gun to my head, I would say no, it's not our last chance.
Okay. So, we have a few years, right?
I think so. And again, let me take another counter just to build on this conversation. If it is our last chance and 79 companies make all the money, governments will get massively involved.
And like it may lead to a nirvana, like, you know, back to where we come from and where we're sitting.
Could extreme capitalism mean a different version of socialism, right?
Coming back to the roots, you know what I mean? Could a world where there's only 100 companies that make 80% of the money, would they then be forced to subsidize all the displaced workers? Do we live in a three-day work week environment with the other four days subsidized from the companies that we work for? Do we have more leisure? Do we get more into the arts and family? And do we have side projects that make these micro pennies? I don't know.
So, what if tomorrow everything crashes for you, like VaynerMedia, you lose your followers? What would you do if you have a laptop and AI?
If I lost my reputation and my personal brand, but I kept my knowledge of how to make content on social, I would build an app that's $5 to $50 a month, and I would make unlimited organic content on LinkedIn, Twitter, TikTok, and try to get customers.
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That's a very interesting approach. I just talked to Bill Gurley, who's like a legendary investor, and he told me, 'You can't even imagine how many websites are there that are just like passport photos that charge you $6.' And yes, AI can do that, but because we're still so used to going to a website and paying, and they're making tens of thousands of dollars a month, and we just don't realize it. Because for me as a person in Silicon Valley, right, I'm looking at all the businesses and I'm like, 'Okay, I can totally see how Anthropic releases new lines of code tomorrow and this business is done.' And that's not how consumers work.
He's right. It's not how it works. And in fact, I would argue what I do for a living and what I'm obsessed with actually explodes in this next era. It's all going to be about brand because you have to discover it. There, in 30 years, by default, somebody would be like, 'Oh, let me go to the main AI thing and I don't need to.' But there is going to be a long period of time here.
Yeah. So, there is this long tail. We still need to adjust, whereas humans, we take some time to adjust to new reality. So...
When you're a Silicon Valley girl and you even know who Bill Gurley is, you live in a different world than the 99.9% of people on earth who've never heard of Bill.
And that's opportunity for everyone who's listening.
Because transitioning to that era together with small companies, small businesses, other people, educating them. I feel like there is a lot of potential there.
When you layer what I've been obsessed with about the last 20 years, which is there is an advertising and brand-building ecosystem called social media that does not cost you money. And that's the point about AI apps. It really doesn't cost you money anymore to build something in the way that I grew up. But the fact that you can actually get awareness, that you're one TikTok away from having people know who you are and building a platform, that's intoxicating.
But do you have another worry talking about social media, right? I see a lot of AI content, and we're getting flooded with so much content, so we're competing more. But also another thing that I'm always thinking about: what if this social media platform, like, why would they pay human creators? Why would they not, you know, generate AI creators? This is much more personalized content. It's free, and they don't have to pay anyone.
Well, platforms don't pay people.
No, they really don't. Like Meta doesn't pay people. TikTok doesn't pay people. Like they don't pay people. They are an open vessel that people go on and create for, and then businesses come and sit in between people that make content and people that consume content, and then the businesses advertise on there or go to a creator and do a brand deal. Now, if you're saying why would L'Oreal go to you, like they might today, versus someone that looks kind of like you that they could even own, like a Mickey Mouse...
...and make a hundred videos versus one. They're going to do that. Now, right now, there's stigma around that, and big companies are scared to go too deep into AI because there's pushback. But over the next 5 to 10 years, they will. Now, what they might use you for though is you might be one of the hundred faces they use, 99 of which they own the IP, but you're going to be able to do this. I think the rise of analog value is going to be extraordinary. So, we're sitting in this world right now where people are, a lot of people behind the scenes doing stuff. I think, you know, for me, and I think you know this about me, I'm comfortable and good in both environments, both behal... hosting a conference, having 25 people in this room right now while we do this, right? Brands are going to find incredible value in the analog world. Real-life restaurants, real-life studio podcasts, like real life is going to explode. We're going to live in this barbell world: extreme technology, but extremely scaled. What we take for advantage is like that's normal. Like being outside, like a pop-up shop, you know, going to a sporting event, they're going to continue to increase in value. And so, yeah, you're going to be like, the game's going to change. But I remind influencers, influencers are crying to me quite a bit right now. Like, 'Gary, AI did...' I'm like, you took money from real celebrities. 20 years ago, none of us existed, and all of that money went to Jennifer Aniston. If you were on Shark Tank, you were the only business people. I, Gary Vee, do not have a television show. I get comped for speaking fees and appearance fees greater than most of the sharks, right? That would have never been possible. So, the world turns, changes.
We just get too comfortable in our space.
Well, what's funny is when we're young and we're disrupting something, we like it. But when we're the one that gets disrupted, we don't like it.
Yeah. How are you adjusting your social media strategy?
Nothing because of what we just talked about. To me, I stay in... my last book I wrote was called Day Trading Attention. I live in that environment. So, if AI wasn't even happening right now, I'd still be focused on what I'm focused on: long-form written content. So, much more Substack, Beehiiv, LinkedIn, X, longer-form content. So, I hired two full-time writers on my staff, journalists, who basically will listen to this entire interview, and he's going to come up with 15 to 20 follow-up questions, which is why I needed someone who had a journalistic background because it was just transcribing. I can AI that.
And then we will create a first-person article about the barbell theory, why analog is on the rise, right? So, a lot more written content.
Interesting. And I feel like it's becoming so much easier because I remember a couple years ago, I met, four years ago I met someone from LinkedIn. They were like, you should be on LinkedIn. I'm like, I can't write. So I'm so bad at that. And then ChatGPT came around, and my LinkedIn's growing like crazy.
Yeah. And I've always had ghostwriting infrastructure for my books because I've never been able to write, but I've always wanted it. You know, it's funny. Every book I've written, everyone with my written content, people come up to me, they're like, man, it sounds so much like you. Like it is fully me because it is truly transcribed for my words. I don't write differently than I talk because it's just the transcription. But so writing content, I'm incredibly focused on being, and this I'm pushing my team right now on this, on just being remarkable on every platform, like obsession to how to win Snapchat Spotlight, obsession to understand how to be great at YouTube Shorts to make sure I'm feeding the LLMs of Gemini with my content.
Why shorts, not long form?
Both, but I think, but shorts allows me to pump out a lot of how-to, why, right? There's a little bit of a different thing there. So just hyperfixation on the craft of the written word, the images, testing new formats. I call it pack platforms. So I need to know everything that's happening on Substack, X, Pinterest, Instagram, TikTok, Shorts, all that. That's algorithms within those. What kind of content? What format? Is it a reel? Is it a full... like on LinkedIn, is it... right now, imagery is doing incredibly well. Video crushed last year. It's declining a little bit this month. Like just so what's the algorithm within the platforms doing? Then see culture, like what is happening in popular culture across everything. Like, you know, America is long in popular culture fed from Black culture. Now we're seeing Hispanic culture. We're seeing Korean culture impact so much of US pop culture. Slang terms, quarter zip, Labubu's in then out, the Starbucks bear tumbler for three weeks then not, Stanley Cups then not.
I love your passion when you're talking about this. Like I see...
Well, because pop culture, you know, baggy pants for guys, like pop culture is relevance, right? I can make one reference in here of something that's happening in popular culture, and then for somebody who's listening, if they're also into the same thing I'm into, immediately we are connected, right? We are connected by being born in the same place. Like people look for... we're tribal. We love sports. Religion is because the way it is. Cultures, we have... you and I met immediately. We're just from the same place. It is what it is. But by the way, when I walk outside right now, if somebody's wearing a Jets hat, they're immediately my brother.
So, you know, I think pop culture, especially in B2B environments, is very misunderstood. But even B2C environments, the biggest consumer brands I work with in my day-to-day, I think they underestimate pop culture.
Yeah. Even creators, like I'm talking to so many big brands, and they've never advertised with creators, and I'm just surprised. Let me pause here for a second because what we've been talking about connects directly to something my team has been actively testing. Running a media company, the operational load never stops because you prep for podcast episodes, you have to push content to multiple platforms, and somewhere in between, a million documents landing in your inbox waiting for your decision. That's our day-to-day. And a few weeks ago, my team started testing something that's been changing how we handle it. That's AxioWork. And what I appreciate most about it is that you can build a full secure agent team for your business, not just one AI. Each agent has its own identity, intelligence, tools, skills, and persona. You can create as many as you need, full custom, and they work in parallel with a pre-built library of connectors already set up: Gmail, Shopify, HubSpot, social platforms, nothing to configure. And here is what that actually looks like in practice. So, for example, my team runs three agents: a strategist, a producer, a CPO. The CPO leads the agent team, keeping operations aligned and making sure nothing falls through the cracks. The producer works under the strategist. Content decisions are always backed by data before anything goes into production. Each agent has a defined role, a clear reporting line, and they coordinate directly with each other without me in the middle. You can also set up recurring scheduled tasks, things that run automatically every day without anyone touching them. Set a time, set a task, and it runs. For example, every morning at 10:00 a.m. my CPO agent sends the whole team a briefing with the latest industry news. No one has to ask for it. It just lands in the chat. AxioWork is built by Alibaba, 26 years of B2B infrastructure behind it. That's what makes it different from a generic tool. Right now, there's a limited-time offer: two weeks of unlimited access to top-tier models, including Claude 4.6. The link is in the description. So, you're saying you're not running faster because of AI, just doing whatever you're doing.
I'm saying that I don't have a different social media strategy right now because of AI per se. If I wake up from a coma right now in seven years and everything's different, it will not take me long to get back on the bike and be successful because I'll just spend 100 days paying attention to where is everyone paying attention to? 'Oh my god, AI changed everything. We're back to reading newspapers.' Okay, I'm going to make newspaper ads. Like, it's not complicated. The thesis is simple. Understanding and how to be good at the thesis is hard.
Has your hiring changed because of it? How many people do you have now?
You know, it's funny you say that. We at Vayner... so I have many different companies, but the biggest one I run is VaynerX, VaynerMedia, and there's also Slate Media and the Tomorrow Group. Three very large advertising agencies, all of which do something pretty similar. We're exploding, and I'm having this very, very challenging game. I mean, I was in Seattle yesterday, as you heard before we went on here. I met with the three biggest companies that are HQ'd there. All of which are like, 'We want to do more with you. We want to do a lot with you.' Two that are already working with us, a third that wants to jam with us. So, the demand of customers is exploding. I still need an extraordinary amount of human beings because it's a human-based business. Yes, I understand that AI can do the job of others. It is not lost on me that 100 people can now do the work of 400 people. I'm just worried about the output wars of the future. What if you're competing with somebody that has 400 and you have 400? You cut 200 and they still have 400. And in our world, you and I, we're like, 'Ah, we're outflanking them. We're going to be better. We're going to make more.' But what if they weaponize those 400 people with the same tools that we weaponize our 200 people? In my world, advertising, if my 400 people now make 27,000 ads and your 200 people make 16,000 ads for whatever human element is there, and I understand it doesn't work that way, but there's this concept of is AI a shield and a sword and a gun versus rocks in a war, right? You would think 200 will beat 400, but what if the 400 also have shields and swords? And so there's something here that I haven't fully figured out. I'm definitely being cautious. We are definitely first and foremost attacking things that do not have value. For example, if you're a project manager at VaynerMedia and your sole... because you know every project manager comes in different shapes and sizes, but if you're the kind of project manager who only takes notes, like that is how you... Well, that person has already been kind of smoked out and asked to do more.
Was there something that you transformed with AI within your team that blew your mind? You're like, 'Oh my god.'
My mind has not been blown since kind of the, you know, I had a lot of friends in Silicon Valley talking that machine learning was getting better and better, and I was like, maybe I'm impressed on how fast everything is happening, but I'm in a point where like, yes...
To me, basically, here's where my head's at. I'm going to take my phone and be like, 'Build this app. I want to do this.' Enter. Done. So if I'm already there, everything in between is just a step to that. That's where I think we're going.
Anything you transformed in your process, or you just started executing by yourself? I mean, like building...
Probably the biggest thing that happened to me is I am an anthropologist, pop culture strategist. So having that level of thinking power with me that I used to rely on search and like just digging around the internet, that was profound. I feel the same when I was flying here yesterday. I was playing with Claude skills, which is like a skill that you can build that executes for yourself. It was preparing me for this interview, and I was like, this is fascinating. I feel like I'm a superhuman with all these tools because Perplexity Comet every day sends me stocks to buy. Claude skills does my research. It's just fascinating.
Yeah. But I also think it feels like a superhero today. The same way I felt with the iPhone that first year with the iPhone. So I bought the iPhone the day it came out. Especially in New York because of Wall Street and any big city, there was BlackBerry obsession, and I felt like a superhero that first year because I could go on the internet for real, not like the way the BlackBerry people could. And that gave me a hyper advantage. Like I would go and do... at that point I was already out about a little bit. I would go and do something and I could look something up before I went on stage or went into a meeting, and that was like powerful in a way that, you know, I didn't have to do with my laptop even though I used to have that. It was just so fast. You feel like a superhero with Claude, Perplexity, GPT, Meta's infrastructure starting to get very impressive.
To remind everybody who's listening, your grandmother in the office did not have internet, did not have AI, did not have social media...
Didn't have an office to your point, did not have mobile computing, did not have a computer in the office, did not have internet, like...
Yeah, I mean this is just technology. But do you feel that we're in this period of time and we are like 1% that are grasping technology? Do we need to run faster to make the most out of it, or you...
Well, it depends on the human ambition. I mean, I think a lot of people are going to check out of this era. Let's talk about Silicon Valley. I have a lot of Silicon Valley friends who were psycho all-in, going so hard during early Web 2.0, 5, 6, 7, 8, blogging, podcasting, and then social, who made enough money and are in a different part of their life now, who have given a damn about AI and blockchain.
Everyone wants to build wealth. I feel like this is just such an opportunity, and it's unique for the next 10 years. I feel like we have this year...
And then it's basic for everyone.
I don't think... I think that makes sense that you think that, and I understand that. I think you and I will see each other in 10 years and be like, man, you were right. It just... as much as it looks like AI creates a winner-takes-all world, I have a funny feeling it's not going to.
Because don't forget, there is the human... like, it's going to take too much time. Like, you know what people don't do well. Hang with me for a second. Let's play this game. Let's take that point. Let's say 10 companies won everything. Do you literally think that 8 billion people are going to be like, 'Yeah, that's awesome'?
Okay. And governments would... yeah. So that's it.
It's just funny to hear this from you because you're the one like, 'Hustle, do this.' Like...
People don't like to take my sentence in its totality. Hustle. Go hard. If you complain and are a crybaby and you don't realize that accountability can help you, hustle if you like it so much that you would do it if it was free. I would build businesses if it was free. Meaning like it made me... like it's my joy. I build companies the way people like to go golfing and cooking and watching movies. It's more fun to me. You know, it's so funny. We put on a pedestal someone who's a philosopher or a great reader. Someone who reads books all day in the room is a real thinker and writes. 'Oh wow, so noble.' That's what I do. I just do something with it on the other side. You know what I mean? So I think hustle if it makes you happy. One could argue that the extreme opposite of hustle is what I also do. I mean, the more you know me, the more you would realize I'm incredibly detached from my career or my public persona. I'll make it very blunt. I don't give a damn about Gary Vee or my Vayner empire. I do not think it makes me better than... Who cares if I'm good at business? Some people are good at skiing. Some people are good at singing. Some people are good at writing. Like, it just happens to be something I'm good at. I have my self-worth wrapped up into who I show up as a human to people in my life. That I'm a nice guy, that when I...
Was that a switch ever in your life, or...?
Absolutely not. Never. It was ingrained in me by my mother and my circumstances and my DNA.
What would you say to someone who thinks their worth is tied to their results, and that makes them very anxious in this era?
Correct. I would tell them that first of all, it depends on what results, right? You know, if you're saying financial results...
I don't know, I'm in Silicon Valley. Great. Your company's valuation.
I would say I understand. It's a very common human trait. I would also say that almost everybody I know on earth that is wrapped up in that metrics mindset has incredible anxiety, and anxiety sucks.
How do you separate yourself from... But I feel like it's easier to say for you because you have all the millions of followers already and millions of dollars.
You're saying that because you don't know me. If my friends that have known me my whole life will tell you that I have the millions of followers and dollars because I've always been this way.
