- May 31, 2018 -

Gary Vaynerchuk. You're either a fan or you're not.

The guy who as a wine critic grew his family’s wine business from $3 million to $60 million...

I could hang with him.

The guy who built his personal brand by being the loudest, crudest voice in the room...

I've been known to drop some 4-letter words so no judgement on that.

But shock value has a short life span.

The guy who takes digital marketing to a level of hyper frenetic posting, tweeting, vlogging blah blah blah...

I'd freaking pull the rest of my hair out!

Gary Vee is a really smart dude - but there's there's a fork in the road where he and I part ways.

...never to see eye to eye.

...no give or take.

...no wiggle room.

Here's my beef: Gary claims all business owners are just in one business...the ATTENTION business.

Well...no, they're not, Gary.

Businesses are in the business of creating customers.

As in making money.

I can get a boat load of attention through all kinds of media including social media...and be out of business real fast.

Attention (and social media) is a tool.

Not a strategy.

Anybody who's taken a Marketing 101 course knows about the age-old 4-letter (not 1-letter) acronym A.I.D.A. – Attention, Interest, Desire, Action.

Gary puts down traditional media and touts social media as the be-all, end-all holy grail of marketing...

...which is simply not true.

Businesses (including mine) still use traditional media and are making a good profit.

Yep, I'm even talking about good old postcards. They work as well for me today as they did 25 years ago.

And apparently the big guns, like Google and Facebook, agree since they're now using direct mail to reach prospects.

What do ya have to say about that, Gary?

For those of you still reading...I am not drinking the social media Kool-Aid and I don't think you should, either.

Ready for one more reason?

Gary has a blind spot when it comes to the subject of ROI.

One of his social media tips is to NOT obsess about ROI...

...perhaps because he can't measure with any degree of accuracy the effectiveness of Tweeting, Snapping, going Live or posting to Instagram.

His comeback to anyone who asks him how he can justify all the time he spends ranting on social media?

"What's the ROI of your mother?"

Really? That's all you got, Gary?

What kind of business advice is it to just brush off ROI?

If I gave that advice to my clients, I'd have been out of business a long time ago.

And I would have deserved it.

Listening to this type of advice and perspective is a lot like watching Fox News. Lol

Fair and balanced?

Uh, that would be NO.

I'll say it again...social media is a tool. That's it. Nothing more, nothing less.

It can and does work great for some companies. It sucks for others.

Billboards work great for some businesses.

Newspaper ads and direct mail work great for others.

And, yeah, even TV commercials work great for some companies.

There are many paths that'll get you to the top of the mountain.

Gary Vaynerchuk is a very smart dude. But I doubt he'll be Friending me anytime soon.

Talk soon.

Can't wait? Let's chat now.

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