Resy co-founder Gary Vaynerchuk talks ‘profound’ changes in ad industry | Wilnesh News

VaynerMedia CEO Gary Vaynerchuk said social media algorithms have given rise to a more elite advertising landscape, but the industry has been slow to catch up.

“The social media that I grew up with… was more like email marketing,” the agency’s executive told CNBC’s Tania Bryer at the Cannes International Festival of Creativity. A major event in the advertising world.

Vaynerchuk is the co-founder of restaurant reservation platform Resy and an early investor in X social media platform (formerly Twitter).

“Every brand here, you try to gather as many followers as possible, and then you post and a certain percentage of those people will see it,” he said.

“Over the last two, three, five years, we now live in a world of social media where artificial intelligence algorithms are giving you ‘recommended for you’ pages and content is finding an audience.”

“For You” is a feature of Chinese social media app TikTok that provides scrollable video streams based on trending content and a user’s past use of the app.

“You know, I spent 15 years amassing tens of millions of followers. Yet, a person walking down the Croisette (Cannes) today who has never posted can make a video and probably get more views than I have more,” Vaynerchuk said.

“I think the meritocracy around content is empowering…For the first time in the history of marketing, you can publish something without paying any money to amplify it and have it seen by millions of people. .

Still, the advertising industry remains focused on traditional formats such as print ads and 30-second spots, he continued.

“Brands are built on social media, and it’s time to truly respect the art, craft and advertising in that medium. The longer you wait, the more likely it is that newer brands will take your market share,” Vaynerchuk said.

X CEO Elon Musk gave one of the most anticipated speeches at the Cannes Festival of Creativity, his appearance widely seen as an attempt to build bridges with the advertising industry, with whom he has collaborated since he recently took over the company. Relations within the advertising industry have been fraught.

Musk said Wednesday that his controversial posts from last year — when he Tell advertisers to “go f**k yourself” – not to “advertisers as a whole” but to consider “free speech”.

“It’s important to have a global platform for free speech where people with different opinions can express their views,” Musk said, according to a report. “In some cases, some advertisers insist on censorship.” axios report.

“Of course, advertisers have the right to appear next to content they feel is compatible with their brand. That’s totally fine. It’s not cool to insist that content they disagree with cannot be on the platform,” he said.