Case Study

How our client achieved 70x growth and a built a long-term brand using our unique NFT marketing strategy

Our client used our unique NFT marketing strategy to dramatically transform their results, 70x’ing their growth nearly overnight, as they were able to effectively scale their ad spend from $200 a day, to $14,000 a day.

Our proven and repeatable system is completely different from the old and overused tactics that have saturated the NFT market. This two-step process has helped our client build a marketing machine that runs 24/7 to build a loyal and engaged community of 140,000 discord followers, 60,000 twitter followers and counting.

Unlike other methods, this strategy builds long-term trust and brand awareness, and helped our client overcome a major technological hurdle during their first launch that would’ve been disastrous for other NFT brands.

The Problem:

Our client had struggled to reliably scale their marketing budget and hit their growth targets for 2021-2022.

Neither paid nor organic strategies were providing the results they wanted, in terms of building a well-known and trusted NFT brand with a high value offering

They were running Facebook, Google, and Instagram ads, but failed to get the volume or quality of leads needed to fill their whitelist prior to launch.

In addition to paid marketing, they used several organic strategies that produced temporary results but were not scalable and risked hurting the brand long term.

Timing is everything

Slow growth was not an option for our client, who was eager to capture a piece of 2021’s quickly growing, and increasingly competitive NFT landscape.

They knew they had a limited window of opportunity to establish themselves with a strong launch, due to the highly anticipated explosion of the Metaverse. Every passing day represented a significant opportunity cost, so they had to scale quickly and sustainably to stay ahead of the curve.

The current climate has drawn countless new NFT projects into this increasingly crowded space, all selling hopes and dreams as “the next big thing”. The average NFT investor, and larger “whales” are bombarded by this messaging daily.

Our client understood that trust and transparency were critical in building a long-term brand with high-value offerings, as investors were increasingly suspicious of worthless NFTs, ‘rug pulls’ and fly-by-night scammers.

They needed an efficient strategy to cut through the noise and get their messaging to a large audience, without sacrificing their credibility in the process.

The true cost of ineffective (and untrustworthy) organic strategies

Anyone who has spent time around this space is familiar so called ‘organic’ marketing strategies that have given NFTs a bad name.

Bots and manual spammers flood the DMs of potential buyers, promising a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to invest in unknown and unproven NFTs, regardless of whether they intend to keep their promises.

Some of these Instagram ‘marketers’ have become more clever, posing as NFT investors themselves participating in a giveaway that requires them to spread the word.

The YouTube comment strategy is another marketing ‘hack’ that is quickly becoming saturated and raising red flags among savvy investors. NFT creators pose as the ‘voice of reason’, commenting on related content in hopes of simulate an organic community buzz.

While these methods may have worked in the past, the NFT community is beginning to expose those who use them. Brands that cut corners with these kinds of strategies might earn a quick flood of traffic but will face negative blowback in the long term once the community starts to catch on.

Influencer marketing is another tactic that most NFT brands get wrong. They partner with the wrong influencers, deploy the wrong messaging, and lack a strong funnel to capture the resulting leads.

The trouble with Twitter

Our client knew that Twitter still represented the best opportunity to reach high-quality NFT buyers, but they struggled to get the reach and visibility necessary to make an impact.

Thanks to Twitter’s increasingly ad-based business model, organic reach is at an all-time low. Paid advertising is an absolute requirement to reach most users on the platform.

However, NFT brands hit a major roadblock when they try running Twitter ads. Even though Twitter’s Financial Services policy does not specifically mention NFTs, advertisers quickly find their ads removed and accounts disabled, due to broad policies that apply these kinds of opportunities. Simply by using the term “NFT”, mentioning the blockchain, or using several other related terms will trigger an account ban within minutes after launching ads.

Our client had their ad account banned multiple times and were all but ready to give up on this marketing channel. What they didn’t realize was that they could still tap into the Twitter goldmine with a slightly different strategy that does not violate Twitter’s policies

The Solution:

Using our unique two-part strategy, our client has broken through their major sticking points with both organic and paid marketing, and rapidly scaled their growth despite a major technical setback upon their initial launch.

How did they do it?

Influencer marketing done right

Influencer strategy does still work in, but it requires careful selection of the right influencers combined with the right funnel.

Despite what many failed marketers would think, an influencer’s follower count or “clout” does not translate into real white listers, ready to mint your NFT upon launch. Most so-called influencers or micro-influencers have poor engagement (our an outright fake following), which leads to low reach and subpar ROI.

Using our established partnerships with top-tier influencers that are proven performers in the NFT space, we were able to drive qualified traffic to our client’s funnel that eventually converted into buyers.

Cracking the Twitter code

Twitter is still, hands down, the most important platform in the NFT space. When it comes to getting high-quality leads that translate into real buyers, nothing else comes close.

After they had faced countless bans and failed attempts to advertise, we showed our client an alternative strategy that worked within Twitter’s guidelines and captured highly targeted traffic on demand.

By unlocking the Twitter goldmine (unavailable to 95% of the competition who doesn’t know how), and leveraging under-utilized platforms like Quora and Reddit, our client quickly scaled their ad spend to $14,000 a day.

Given the right targeting and messaging and driving traffic to the right kind of community-based funnel has given them the power to control their destiny for years to come.

The power of community

The first part of our strategy fixed the bottlenecks of our client’s inbound traffic, making their advertising budget work effectively.

The second part involved building a strong community of raving and loyal fans who would help take the brand to the next level. Currently, Discord is the best platform to do this.

Unlike Twitter or other social media platforms, our client ‘owns’ 100% of their community on Discord. They can reach and engage with them at will. Discord also provides nearly endless customization, in terms of user experience.

Our client hired community managers to engage 24/7, nurturing the community, unveiling the roadmap, providing entertainment and other value - helping shape the conversation and building trust through transparency and consistency.

Smart investors view a strong Discord presence as a top credibility marker when they research any new NFT. A vibrant community of true fans will help build a brand far better than spammy DMs or YouTube comments ever will.

Unlike many of their competitors, people believe and trust that our client will fulfill their promises. The real, organic buzz that has begun in their community has already begun to snowball upon itself, fueling exponential growth even beyond the direct spend of their robust advertising campaigns.

The bottom line

A failed launch can be disastrous for an NFT brand, and often impossible to recover from. Your entire marketing budget, development costs, and team salaries could go down the drain if you make a mistake that causes your brand to be mistrusted among an NFT community that is more sophisticated than ever.

The get rich quick, ‘pump and dump’ era of NFTs is over. Now is the time to build a real brand, which will pay dividends for years. To accomplish this, you must build an upwards virtuous cycle that starts with bringing the right kind of audience into your community.

If you’re ready to take the next step, and do NFT marketing right, contact us today.