Five Hours With Gary Vaynerchuk
On Friday, March 4th, fellow Infusionite, Derek Solomon and I got a dream opportunity to handle the logistics for Gary Vaynerchuk at Infusionsoft’s annual user conference, ICON. The name of the game with logistics is making sure the speakers you are entrusting your company’s brand image to for the hour or so they are on the main stage, have the best possible experience. Event logistics are about as glamorous as one could imagine. So, I am going to chop a lot of that out here and get into something more interesting… what I learned by spending five precious hours with Gary Vay-ner-chuk.
One of the first things Gary did on the car ride over was ask us for detail on who was in our audience. Not only demographics, but what were they likely struggling with, problems they were looking to solve, and what had I heard them saying on social during the event. He was also actively engaging with the audience from Venture Madness, the previous conference he spoke at that day. Yes, you heard that right, I got to see a Gary Vee double header! Humblebrag alert: my shoulder makes a guest appearance in his video below to Vincent Orleck.
@VincentOrleck@jesselobellpic.twitter.com/VoQK8qrRlv
— Gary Vaynerchuk (@garyvee) March 4, 2016
I have never seen a speaker who actively taps into the audience the way Gary does. For a little context, this was my fourth ICON, umpteenth conference, and I waayyyy over index on YouTube vlogs/interviews/talks consumption. I commonly come across speakers who regurgitate the same talk over and over. What was really cool was to see the way Gary preps for his talks. He LISTENS. He is listening to people around him and to social all the time. He takes all of that in. That is how he is able to rip people’s faces off every single time with the value he throws down, it’s ALWAYS new. As he has mentioned time and time again and I can now personally attest to, his EQ is through the roof!
There is something really cool about watching someone else meet a person they admire. The smiles and excitement written all over their face, the shrieks of joy, and just pure electric energy exuding from them. I got to witness this over and over again when working the book signing line and it never got old. Again, Gary impressed me. He genuinely remembered SO many of his fans in the Vayner Nation. Listening to Gary and his fans exchange memories and moments that changed their life was beyond touching. There were also quite a few people who were introduced to Gary for the first time at ICON, they waited through the massive line to meet him and tell him how glad they were to have been exposed to him that day. With each interaction, he made direct eye contact, he focused on each person like that person was the only person he was going to meet that day. The care he has for people is indescribable and something I strive to emulate.
Hey #ICON16 attendees & #vaynernation! If you have a copy of @garyvee's book #AskGaryVee, tell me what do you think! pic.twitter.com/wE0erv7NXP
— Christina Kehoe (@ChristinaAKehoe) March 6, 2016
Snapchat Secret: That book signing actually wasn’t even planned. I asked him to do it on the car ride to the event, 3 hours before it happened. Being the mensch Gary is, he moved around a few phone calls and meetings to get another hour of space in to make it happen. That’s right! Gary rearranged his very very busy schedule to get more face time with people and he was excited about it!
Which brings me to the next thing, you should buy Gary’s newest book, #ASKGARYVEE and all of his other books if you haven’t already! I am a few chapters in and I LOVE IT!!! I particularly love how he incorporated questions from the Vayner Nation community. While you are at it, get one for someone who hasn’t heard of Gary yet. Sharing is caring. Shout out alert: That’s actually how I was exposed to Gary for the first time, Mychal Edelman shared his copy of The Thank You Economy with me and I was hooked!
Gary Vaynerchuk speaking at #ICON16 | Photo : Tristan Griffiths (AllThingsNetworking.com)
It was a dream spending time with you! You say that you are only as good as your last at bat, your last keynote, etc. I think you are only as good of a human being as the last person you interacted with and you are an incredibly great one! With an EQ like that, I am glad you didn’t turn out to be Hitler, I’m glad you chose to be the good guy. 😉 Thank you again for the impact you have had on my life.
Side rant: Over the last few days I have had a bunch of people telling me how lucky I am for all the experiences I have had in my life. I think “luck” is a word I now decidedly detest more than the term guru. I have come to find that luck is a term that people who play defense in life use to describe the accomplishments of others.
So while some may say I am “lucky”… and yes, I am sure there is a little bit of luck and privilege involved with every success. I believe luck is a much smaller part of the equation than most factor. I’ll let you in on a secret, I get many of the opportunities I do because I choose to play offense. I choose to put myself in uncomfortable situations. I choose to make sacrifices others won’t. I choose to ASK for what I want (Thank you Jia Jiang). I choose to focus and expend mental energy only on causes I am passionate about. I choose to position myself alongside world class leaders and human beings. By living my life in this way, I exponentially increase my chances of being in the right place at the right time and having these “lucky” experiences. All of these factors have led to me being able to accomplish my dreams, goals and what will propel me to all of my future successes. That’s how I roll.
***Special thanks to Infusionsoft Director of Events, Pam Gibbons for being a leader who believes in people and their dreams and entrusting me with this task. To Derek Solomon for being my partner in crime for those 5 mind blowing hours and collaborating with me on all the logistical details leading up. To Vincent Oreleck for pushing me to write this. 👊