Gary Vaynerchuk, the Wine Library and branding guru gave a speech yesterday at SXSWi. A lot will be written about it–his boisterous personality, truly interactive style of speaking, and punctuated (i.e. he swears a lot) thoughts on branding made for some great discussion. He really got the audience involved by spending the majority of the time doing Q & A and inviting audience members up on stage for hugs. The presentation even ended with an improvised rap about the social web.

Gary’s thoughts on branding are basically this: the brand exists in the consumer’s mind through its every touch point. Whether that be through the company website, an outdoor advertisement, or over the phone customer service, people associate positive and negative perceptions of the brand. Gary cited Zappos in saying that their helpful customer service (via phone, social media, or email) and quick delivery makes us “go batshit” since most companies’ customer service is horrendous.

While Gary certainly talks the talk, he also puts his money where his mouth is. After running into Gary in the convention center lobby, we struck a discussion on the way to his presentation. He was enthused about what Squeaky does–nevermind the fact that he was about to give a presentation in front of 1,000+ people. He even suggested our Squeaky employee, Scott, take a photo, although the camera caught him looking a bit creeped out.