In the Initial Coin offering (ICO) and cryptocurrency ecosystems, judicious ICO marketing, is essential to running successful projects.
In years gone by, when there were only a few ICO’s, marketing wasn’t a big deal. Projects with very good concepts could get by on the strength of their ideas. However, this has changed drastically in recent times.
In 2017, the cryptocurrency community witnessed a meteoric rise 1COs launched, especially in the last quarter of the year. There were over 700 ICO’s, but less than 30% reached their soft cap. The glut of ICOs and scams confused potential investors, with many spending considerable time trying to figure out where to invest. Often, ICO’s with more visibility, usually come out on top.
The ICO process of raising money for start-ups is still in its infancy. A lot of ICOs failed because they did not have solid marketing plans to back their strategy. Some of these unsuccessful ICOs have great ideas and vision, however, their marketing lacked purpose and direction.
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1. Have an Excellent Whitepaper
Crafting a clear and succinct whitepaper is vital to having a successful ICO. Unsuccessful ICOs often fail to present potential investors with important details about their project. Whitepapers are like guides for potential investors, and must include every important aspect of any given project.
Contributors study whitepapers to help them better understand projects, and to ascertain which projects are worth investing in. Things like how much capital will be raised? What critical problem is your company solving? How does your smart contract work? What exchanges will you be listing on? Who are your team members? And what benefits are available to the common user? All these and more should be clearly explained.
How you present your whitepaper matters a lot. Keep in mind that it is one of the first initial impressions, you will be making on your potential investors. You must brand your whitepaper, and highlight the team behind your project. Make sure that information about your team members are verifiable, this will help establish trust between your team and clients.
Hire professionals to write, edit and create your designs. Also, make sure that numbers and dates are consistent within your whitepaper. Remember that your whitepaper is one of the most important components of your ICO marketing, and you must get it right, to succeed.
2. Promote Your Brand on Social Media
Having a nice functional website and a sound whitepaper helps your ICO succeed. However, if they aren’t visible to investors, your ICO will fail. ICOs have very short lifespans, hence, effort must be made to get the word out about your ICO as soon as possible. You should be adept at using social media platforms in highlighting the strengths of your project, and drive traffic to your website. Useful social media platforms for promoting ICOs include:
Reddit.com: is a great platform for marketing your ICO content, due to the amount of traffic it attracts. Reddit is ranked the 12th most visited website globally, on Alexa.com, and it already has a vibrant cryptocurrency community.
LinkedIn: is useful for creating strategic partnerships with more than 500 million professionals worldwide. Also, linking your team members LinkedIn profiles to your whitepaper enhances your credibility.
Telegram: is mainly a messaging app. It allows both group and direct messaging and is fundamentally committed to privacy. It is valuable for building online communities, especially for ICOs, where a lot of users prefer anonymity.
Bitcointalk.org: This platform is arguably the most active, popular and largest cryptocurrency forum on the internet.
There are other equally useful social media platforms that can help you market your project effectively like, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Discord, etc. Work on the design and feel of your website and social media channels, it should all sync up at one point or another with your whitepaper through mutual branding.
3. Advertisements
Facebook, Twitter, and Google have recently allowed back cryptocurrency advertisements. There are other different options available, depending on your project’s budget. Nonetheless, it is imperative that you develop a plan to showcase your ICOs potential across your social media platforms, Google, and YouTube.
Pay-per-click (PPC): One of the better options for advertising online is pay-per-click (PPC). This model of advertising, is often used to drive traffic to specific websites. Pay-per-click is linked with search engines, like Microsoft Bing Ads and Google AdWords. This is a great way to gain visibility because it can accommodate any budget size.
Ico Listing Websites: Posting Ads on ICO listing websites such as Icobench, Icobox, Token market, etc. is great for gaining publicity. Potential investors visit these websites to see what is new, and worth investing in.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO): This helps you grow your visibility organically. It includes creative and technical components to improving your rankings. Get your links out there through publications, back-links, and media outreach.
You should also consider having a name like Forbes or Entrepreneur attached to your brand. This would surely boost your credibility in the cryptocurrency community.
4. Community Engagement
You should allocate resources, to target online cryptocurrency communities. Numerous cryptocurrency communities abound on platforms like Bitcointalk, Reddit, Facebook, Discord, Quora and Telegram. Your community engagement should start with these communities, as they have large numbers of ICO enthusiasts in their midst, and people respond very well to AMAs and influencer interviews. Research on cryptocurrency specific websites, and plan your ICO marketing strategy around these communities, through direct engagement.
5. Newsletters and Blog Updates
Updating your community and potential clients is very important when marketing your ICO. Newsletters and blog updates are the easiest methods, to reach your community on development progress, and other important information.
Blogging is a great tool for ranking your website, using search engine optimization (SEO). Search engines are always on the lookout for new content to rank, and websites are often static. However, integrating your blog to your website, and constantly updating it, helps it rank higher on search engines like Google.
Sending out newsletters is essential to community engagement. Regular updates ultimately show that you care about your audience, and their perception of you. There should be a uniformity about your updates that coincide with your brand, and analyzing metrics on who opens your newsletter is a good gauge of success and failure.
Summary
In short, 2017 was the year that established ICOs as a mainstay in the cryptocurrency ecosystem, and the stake has been raised in 2018. With new regulation, and investor wariness about the increasing amount of fraudulent ICOs, you need a shrewd ICO marketing plan to reach your targets. This is an easy guide to get you started. However, to ensure success, you should consider hiring the services of Crowdcreate.us. We are consistently ranked as one of the best cryptocurrency marketing agencies on the web. We leave nothing to chance, and will help you develop a comprehensive ICO marketing strategy, to ensure your projects success.
