Many traditional marketing fundamentals apply to NFT marketing, however, it is essential to understand the five steps that are unique to marketing NFTs, and how they work together: Concept, Collaboration, Community, Kick-off & Continue
Getting these right is critical. Here is a brief explanation of each one, followed by use cases in later modules.
- Concept
Initially many creators simply started with a piece of art, often modeled on the snarky-slash-sassy look and feel of a Bored Ape or a Crypto Kitty, and did pretty well. In 2023 and beyond, however, even art-first projects often extend their projects to include utility and/or physical objects; and there are an increasing number of innovative utility-first projects as well that are reaching out to artists, causes, and brands as their concepts develop. Creators are spending more time developing their concepts than they have in the past, and combining conceptual elements together to create something truly compelling, that will attract both collaborators and a community that will become your customers.
To fully develop the concept, there are a few more steps that involve traditional marketing:
• Identify the target audience
• Develop a brand
• Create a website
2. Community
One of the most difficult parts of launching an NFT is to build a community. For artists, celebrities, brands and others lucky enough to already have a sizable following, it is less of an issue. But from a cold start, an NFT creators needs to Be created before the launch, and be proportionate in size to the size of the first collection in order to create momentum. Our discussion on marketing is completely focused on ways to build communities by participating in the NFT-base social and online media, earned media and by partnering with collaborators.
3. Collaborators
The best way to build a community from an ice-cold launch without a massive investment fund, is to leverage collaborators. These could be charities, brands, businesses or other associations, even blockchains able to give grants to NFT projects with a killer concept. Coinbound.io recommend 15+ alliances for a major launch, but even one great collaboration can put your project on the map. Since Coinbound.io also recommends a budget of $10,000 to $15,000 minimum to develop a community for a marketing launch, it is well worth attending meet-ups and make a few calls a week to find the right collaborators on your own.
4. Kick-off strategy
Many great projects stall out because they don’t have a kick-off plan that creates urgency, incentives, and a home for your community to receive alerts and research more about the project. Elements in your kick-off plan include a website to house the elements, such as a roadmap that outlines dates and releases, and a white list in addition to more information about the project. DO post a “countdown clock” and send reminders of the countdown to your community as the date approaches. If family and friends are going to make some of the initial NFT purchases, time this accordingly, and stagger the pricing so that some sales are above the floor. See Module 10 for pricing and structuring theories.
5. Continuity
Too many NFT brands fizzle because they fail to come up with a continuity strategy. A number of smaller, timed releases may be better than, say one of 1000 or 10,000 that fails to sell out and collapses under the weight of a failed launch. So start small and keep the community engaged with lots of dropped incentives for purchasing early, including next drops or future events.
Let’s take these one-by-one starting with the concept.