Skip to content
TrackPodcasts
businessMar 18, 202626:50

The Real Reason Social Media Isn't Working for You

About this episode

In this episode, I talk about the biggest opportunity for real estate agents in 2026: moving past the "old grind" and embracing content as your new foundation. I encourage you to stop making excuses about your busy schedule and start spending 50% of your time on the 7 to 12 platforms where the world’s attention actually lives. I also discuss why being a "human" leader with empathy and humility will always outperform those who are only driven by the next commission check.

 

You’ll learn about:

  • The "Platforms and Handles" (P&H) framework for social media
  • How to show up in the age of AI search
  • The difference between selfless and selfish content
  • Why Snapchat Spotlight and LinkedIn are untapped goldmines
  • How to lead with humanity and scale a massive team

Get every episode summarized

Each time The GaryVee Audio Experience publishes, we email you a written briefing from the transcript — the topics, who appeared, and any specific claims, with the ad reads skipped.

Email me new episodes

Free for 3 shows. No card needed.

Hosts & guests

Transcript ready

803 searchable segments. Every word is indexed and playable.

The Real Reason Social Media Isn't Working for You

The GaryVee Audio Experience

0:00
26:50

Full transcript

The GaryVee Audio ExperienceThe Real Reason Social Media Isn't Working for You. Machine-transcribed; use the interactive transcript above to jump the player to any line.

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 disante Toyota, because they did not gonna hunt 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. This is the GaryVee audio experience.

Gary. Yes, sir. We have real estate agents listening far and wide, and they're bombing down the road in the Range Rovers. They're doing 80 miles an hour, and they want to know. Wait a minute, they're driving rovers? I mean, like they're already doing solid. I think as soon as you get real estate license, you get a Range Rover. God, and now you have to work to pay for it. You 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. More than five a week on average, but they're getting really, really, 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. I posted 397 pieces of content yesterday. Wow. So how about that, everyone? Is that right? 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 I got a 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, you know, 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 100 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. Like, 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 knock on a 1,000 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 3 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. Sure. 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, well, making social media content is a skill. I know, and I'll do it right now, that I can say go to GaryBEE.com slash 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 GaryBEE.com slash attention. I know every day at Act GaryBEE,

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. It's an honor. 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... You get them at this hotel. You can't even tell 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? It 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 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. Like, my sister's a real estate agent. Please find her Liz Nivello. You should refer her or whatever, and give her some action. Where is she an agent? She's in Jersey. Okay, everybody go find Liz Nivello. I think she's got a Liz Nivello 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. I was like, you have, she went heavy on content now. She's like, listen, 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, 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 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 novello, I like Jerome 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 gonna hit good with this audience. Yeah, I think that's gonna land. No, that one's gonna be good. Don't you hate being the last to know me too? That's why you need to subscribe to this YouTube channel. That way you'll get a notification every time we have a new episode. Please like and subscribe and leave us some comments. We wake up every day and check because we wanna hear from you. What else is gonna 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, they do. 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 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 battle ground in real estate is clearly playing out on social. Clearly AI is looming. We had a lot of questions about that. Are we gonna be replaced by AI? How do I use AI in my business? Does it 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. If I was, I'm in Atlanta right now and if Rips needed a house that I had a buy them on, I'm going to Chachi BT and saying, who's the best real estate agent in Atlanta and whatever shows up shows up. That's it. 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, right? Keller is exploded in there. 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. I will say right now, if you're a modern real estate agent, more than 50% of your time is to make content. Wow. And you have to then do everything else in the 49%. 50%, yep, because it will work. 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. 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. Substack.

I brought it up once again. Doing a substack around your Essex County, New Jersey. I'll just keep sticking to Jersey. If you do the Essex County real estate substack, 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 substack 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 substack 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 sh- 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, 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 anymore. Do you know how 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 gonna 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 written 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 gonna really stun a lot of you. Hey, everybody. I 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. They'll make my mom super happy. 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 gonna 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 Highland Park? And that's the opening line in the thumbnail. I'm like, oh, I might be moving to 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 probably is, we have a decent commercial audience. So commercial, 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 platforms I'm obsessed with. Now the rules are 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, 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 and just, right? No, they couldn't follow something that's sophisticated. We understand this. So that's where I'm at 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 large teams from a leadership perspective. How do you make sure that everyone in a company 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... That's 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, and I sent him home. I love that. And he 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. Something that 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 3000 employees, I just texted Haley Grant this morning. I texted Haley Grant this morning. This is real. It's 10 a, 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, like, business anniversary? Yes. What time was that? 10, 34 a.m. A 10, 34 a.m. 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. Yes, she has 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 that meant the world. Yeah, and by the way, we're so close that it didn't mean the world to her 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 fuck 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 it keeps people. That's why no one will ever beat me because I'm going to 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 have been a tremendous friend of the real estate industry. 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? And 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? Because I respect this crew. For everybody who's been listening, if you made it this part 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 going to 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 Nevello, I do not care if anyone does anything I just said. That's a sister. Just to remind everybody. 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 going to do her thing. And her and me and all of you, we go through waves. I actually want to say this because 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 and you crush and then you lose it for like 60 days and you're like, it's because you get hurt and then you stop. And now that four weeks, yeah, that's right. You get dinged up or 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 you know, I respect the work ethic of the majority of the people in this industry. I think a lot of people go into this industry because they think it's easy. And what I like about this industry is the industry spits those workers 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% is 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 because 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, 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 V friends. This is the notorious ninja hat, right? I want every person who has a kid that buys Pokemon to go to vfriends.com. V-E-E-Friends.com. I want them to learn my work. 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 why 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. 22nd, 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 push-ups. That's it. And 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 said, sir. Thank you, sir. I will tell you, we've done over 200 episodes and no one has ever said that. It'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 may key 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, 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 forth and do likewise. Everybody, if you enjoyed this podcast, please go back and look at the prior episodes. They're loaded. I appreciate your attention and thanks for being part of this journey. See you later.

More episodes

More from The GaryVee Audio Experience

View all episodes →