Crush It!

August 24, 2009
Yet another rallying cry to the banner of turning your passion into a career, from braggadocio-ridden entrepreneur Vaynerchuk. After taking over his father's local liquor store, Shopper's Discount Liquors, and building it from a $4 million business to a $50 million one, he created the wine-tasting blog Wine Library TV and discovered the power of the Internet for driving sales. This book shares his experience and step-by-step advice for using Twitter, Facebook, etc., and suggestions for monetizing an online persona, reiterating that the Internet makes it possible for anyone to make serious cash by turning what they love most into their personal brand. His enthusiasm is admirable and his advice solid, but there's nothing new here, and his unappealing swagger—repeated stories of how he “crushed it” and “dominated” grate particularly—gives his story more the tone of adolescent peacocking than of worthwhile and sober business advice.