Many projects in crypto struggle with going to market, build relevance for their product, and capture + cultivate attention successfully. Some core issues I'm seeing after >5 years in the industry (and some thoughts/recommendations): - Projects that build real tech often struggle to build strong, aligned narratives around their technological innovation, remaining too abstract and complex in messaging for broader mindshare traction or relevance outside small information bubbles. Especially for infrastructure teams, positioning their "fancy tech" in a way that people care about it and actually understand it, is often a challenge. Project need a clear and compelling vision for initial PMF that is supported with consistent messaging, and that shapes the positioning around which the marketing strategy evolves, and they need to identify the right distribution channels to spread the message. - Successful marketing on CT (but also socials more broadly) is much more than just posting a few product announcements on the corporate account and some funny memes on the intern account. It requires thoughtful strategizing, consistent messaging, and multi-channel distribution (via main, sub, founder/team and partner accounts, through KOL campaigns, ambassador programs, etc). Web3 brands and their Twitter presences are involved in the same relentless battle for attention as any other brand or even content creator is. Out-of-the-box strategies are required to stand out from the crowd, and properly leveraging crypto-native strategy primitives (NFTs, InfoFi campaigns, airdrops, gamified testnets, point programs, etc.) is crucial too in order to capture attention/mindshare. As many projects fail to understand this, not meaningfully differentiating in terms of positioning and messaging, with weak brands and fragile communities, they tend to fade into irrelevance quickly over time (maybe after a quick TGE hype), often failing at capturing any serious foothold in a fast-moving and complex market environment with short attention spans and a lot of competition. - Often marketing budgets are misallocated and costly KOL campaigns are fired out into nowhere, choosing KOLs with the wrong audiences or focus areas, suffering under fragmented messaging (even within campaigns), focusing on the wrong messaging points, and/or (due to all of that) being perceived as inorganic shill. What projects need, are strategies to work on/with in-house KOL accs (building up team accs or hiring strong CT leads like Breadguy at Mega, Alex at CB, etc.) to strengthen the presence, building strong (ideally non-toxic) cult communities organically to propel mindshare, and leveraging targeted KOL activations to spread clear, aligned and audience-specifically relevant messaging or amplify reach around key announcements, product USPs and user onboarding strategies. - While building presence / hype on socials is important, bootstrapping adoption for the product is what really matters at the end of the day. Leveraging tactics that actually convert is crucial, and targeted, ideally innovative approaches to this issue are likely to win. This goes for incentivization and grant programs that should be focused on high-priority verticals in which a strong positioning and building early network effects seems likely, but also the entire product design and public messaging that is being pushed. Crypto-native strategy elements like airdrops, status NFTs, but also the tokenomics (and thereby enabled user participation) etc. can be powerful catalysts too, and can play a very crucial role, especially for user-facing products. - Expanding on previous point: Infrastructure projects have to be equally thoughtful and innovative here if they want to succeed. This means specifically enabling or even incubating key use cases, bootstrapping initial demand through public good products built on top of the infra, building strong BD capabilities, and focusing on ecosystem building around clear value proposition for the targeted builder audience. It also means dedicated in-house resources that focus on all of this, and that cultivate a hopefully thriving developer ecosystem. It requires messaging that is aligned with the product roadmap, and providing proper docs, educational material, and resources to empower builders (or users and yappers). - Another major difficulty is that all the above needs to come together in a cohesive, overarching marketing strategy that is specifically tailored to the project's fundamental USPs, the narratives around the product(s), the desired positioning and the targeted audiences. Something that is often neglected (or rather underestimated), which leads to fragmented brand positioning and messaging, potentially causing confusion, low conversion rates, and weakened market perception. Because ultimately, building a brand, and consistently capturing + cultivating attention that translates into users/adoption is a continuous and dynamic process. It has to be actively managed and follow a proper strategy to be pulled of successfully in the long-term. - Teams also often fail to acknowledge that the crucial role of their tokens, which should be viewed rather as a product themselves, rather than just a side effect of being in crypto. Tokens are not just important fundraising vehicles for web3 teams that exist in a still largely unregulated space with much less accountability and investor protection than equity in tradfi markets. They are a tool to decentralize ownership and control over protocols, and they are complex financial instruments with utility & value accrual mechanisms that turn them into exposure proxies for various, internet-native asset classes or business models. In the hyper-financialized industry that crypto is, this plays an important role, turning the token into what is often the main public presence of a project, and a 24/7 indicator of sentiment and attention. - Expanding on previous point: Price action is among the most important determinants for mindshare post-TGE (at least based on my experience), and with it, the token is one of the most powerful tools to capture attention and create awareness any project has (but also destroy your reputation and community). Not everyone can do a Hyperliquid-style airdrop in terms of dollar value (even tho making your community rich is omega powerful). But anyone can build value accrual mechanisms that match the business model of the underlying protocol, leverage the token for real community/user participation and ownership distribution to build a loyal base of advocates & product/brand ambassadors, and bootstrap initial adoption. What the key point is here, is that tokenomics matter. Yet, many teams neglect this, launching yet another valueless, perpetually inflating governance token, and losing one of the most power- and impactful marketing tools. - Since we're already talking tokens and TGEs, its also worth noting that the go-to-market strategy for the token specifically, is also highly important in the above context. The crypto space evolves quickly, hypes build up and fall rapidly (also around token launch mechanics & strategies), and where/how a token is launched, how its distributed initially, where it trades on secondary, etc. can have major implications for the post-TGE price action, and especially in the context of user-facing apps/protocols, strongly impact sentiment, user retention and fundamentals more broadly. Many teams execute poorly here, missing out on a major growth opportunity, that often even results in considerable backlash in such cases. - Last but not least, the fundraising strategy along the way is obviously also crucial. Depending on the market environment, finding access to VC money might not be that hard. But getting the right investors onboard in the early stages, investors that can bring value to the table, provide guidance or visibility alongside the money, investors that are aligned with the vision and mission, not just here for a quick buck, is never easy. Not all VCs are bad, and some add real value. But for any project, it can definitely be EV+ to raise KOL or angel rounds that bring on valuable support, and/or hold public sales that enable broad distribution & participation. Especially if the alternative is raising from extractive tier 2 or 3 VCs, it's probably worth the effort. If tied in with sound tokenomics and a proper TGE strategy (see previous point), making the right choices here can lie a solid basis for long-term success. These challenges are not new, and the market has already acknowledged it, which is why there are so many different marketing agencies, growth advisory firms, KOL management companies, etc. out there. Unfortunately though, top tier talent and proper hands-on experience are still scarce resources in our nascent industry, which leads to many sub-par service offerings in an overcrowded market, and making it almost impossible for any successful player to provide consistently high quality at scale. That's why the GTM advisory that we offer at @a1research__ in cooperation with the @steak_studio team, is provided only in tailored service packages with a focus on effectiveness and quality. Our core advisory team that consists largely of KOLs that have successfully built and maintained strong personal brands, combines >20 years of experience in the industry across research, marketing, GTM & product, and is backed by deep tech expertise and tech analytics capabilities. Well equipped to help builders navigate all of the issues I outlined earlier in this post, we work only with a select number of high-potential teams at once, ensuring the highest possible service standards. DM me or @a1research__ if you want to connect.

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