After having it recommended to me exactly eleventy umpteen times, I finally bit the bullet and read Gary Vaynerchuk’s “Crush It!: Why Now Is the Time to Cash In on Your Passion” recently.

I’d been aware of Gary Vaynerchuk for a while. I don’t drink wine and I’m not a Jets fan, but it’s hard to read about building an online empire without running into his name. Once I started seeing his name come up, I read about him a bit and watched some of his speeches. Though I know some people find it unsettling, I really love his energy and how direct he is. Obviously, I’d already grown to appreciate Gary’s ideas before buying the book.

My first impression upon getting the book was how small it is. It’s a hardback, but has the dimensions of a trade paperback. It’s also only about 140 pages, none of which have particularly small type. In fact, one of the pages features just a single word. It gets a good message across, but it’s still a whole page out of only 140 – and the book also includes 2 appendices. Being brief and direct is part of Gary Vaynerchuk’s brand, so I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised that the book would be too.  Considering all the hype, I was expecting a business Bible. It still sort of is, but the size leaves something to be desired.

Despite the brevity, Gary manages to fit a lot of motivation into the book. His passion definitely carries through onto the page, which is especially nice since he dictated the book to a ghostwriter. I wouldn’t want to be that guy (or girl!), by the way. I like Gary, but I just imagine the poor ghostwriter getting yelled at all day. Kudos to you, Mr. or Ms. Ghostwriter.

“Crush It!” begins with information about Gary and his background. He and his family emigrated from Belarus when he was only a few years old, and his father built the family’s liquor store business from next to nothing. Like many people who later find themselves owning their own businesses or doing entrepreneurial things on the side, Gary started out with his own small business ventures (selling baseball cards) as a kid.  This portion of the book came across as good lessons on the value of hard work and learning about the business you want to be involved in.  I’m kind of a people watcher, so I am always interested to find out how someone became what they became.  I know that not everyone wants to read an autobiography when they’re trying to learn about something else though.  If you’re not interested in those connect-the-dots sort of insights, the autobiographical portion of “Crush It!” might seem like a waste of pages to you.

The other half of the book is all about building an online business based on your personal passions. This is what people buy “Crush It!” for, so it’s a good thing that it basically delivers. Gary talks about how to present your content, how to figure out your personal branding, and lots of information about building via social media. If you’re already talking to people regularly on Twitter, Facebook, etc., you’re ahead of the game. Though there were a lot of interesting tips and little “duh, why didn’t I think of that?” passages throughout the book, the business-building section left me a little flat. A fair amount of space was spent on just talking about how stuff like Twitter and Tumblr works, which I didn’t really need. In an already short book, I would have liked to see a little more about strategy, attracting advertisers, figuring out what to sell, and so on. Though I’m obviously not an Internet millionaire (yet), I still felt like I was a bit “further along” than the book’s target audience. The book was also published a few years ago, so the information was probably more innovative and helpful when it was first released. I’m sure that if and when this book is revised for a second edition, it’ll be updated to include more cutting-edge stuff.

One interesting thing Gary brought up was delivering your content in the way you best come across. For him, that’s video. For me, it’s writing. Just like some people learn better depending on format (i.e. book vs. audio book), people tend to also communicate more effectively through the “right” medium. I’m shy, so video isn’t a good fit for me. If you’re outspoken like Gary, it may be a better choice for you. It’s not really rocket science, but it’s definitely something I think a lot of people overlook. Creating content in a medium that isn’t optimal for you may make it seem like more of a chore. If you’re not a strong writer, for example, writing out blog posts might feel tedious and could hold you back from really getting your passion out there.

Keeping the learning component in mind, presenting your content not only in the media that suits you best but also suits your audience best is also something to consider. If you’re capable of communicating effectively through multiple types of media, that will help you reach and connect with different groups of potential fans and customers. If you’re only making your content available in text on your blog, for example, you’re missing out on the huge market of people who listen to podcasts exclusively. This is something I hadn’t even thought about before reading the book, but I’m sure it’s a make-or-break thing for some businesses. This is just one example of the “duh” moments I had throughout the book.

I had somewhat expected to see more in “Crush It!” about actually figuring out what your passion is. For the most part, it assumes you already have some all-consuming niche interest. Many people don’t have just ONE thing they’re nuts about. I know I have a lot of things I’m interested in. I collect things, I know how to make things, I nerd out over lots of different subjects. Figuring out which of these “passions” to follow from a business perspective is something I struggle with, so I figure I’m not the only one. Having more information in this book about picking something to run with and developing it to mastery would have been awesome. Maybe in the sequel?

I can’t help but feel that I would have been better off if I’d bought “Crush It!” when it was first recommended to me. That’s what I get for being cheap! I came away from reading this book thinking that its lessons would have been so much more valuable to me months ago. A good amount of the business advice is stuff that I’ve already heard or learned about elsewhere, as I’ve been reading up on blogging and online business over the past few months. That shouldn’t suggest the book is bad or “nothing new,” though. It still makes unique observations and arguments that made me rethink what I’m doing. It’s still full of good, solid ideas for building a business, many of which I plan to use to my advantage. So in a sense, I do wish I’d read this book months ago – it would have made for a much more linear learning experience.  It’s also entirely possible that some of the stuff I’ve read about online business was influenced by this book and Gary, so that’s something to consider too.

I’d definitely recommend this book to the beginners out there. For more experienced businesspeople, this is probably just going to be another addition to your business library. You might get some good stuff out of it, but it won’t be quite as valuable for you. If you’re not familiar with social media, or aren’t sure how to leverage it for your business, this is a good book for you. It’s also great if you have some sort of idea or interest that you want to build a business around, but aren’t sure how to go about it. For the right person, “Crush It!” is an actionable road map to building a profitable business and being happy at the same time. For the wrong person, it’s still worth reading but not the end-all, be-all book it’s often touted as. I might be the wrong person, but I’m still glad I bought it.