It has been a fascinating time in the past few month learning and working and helping people in blockchain. My focus will still stay with startups — I am passionate about assisting blockchain startups to bring their marketing performance to the next level.
Ever since I was involved in the blockchain industry, the most amusing part for me is people. I met all sort of marketers as well. While I rarely met traditional marketers in the space (social media marketers can be considered as a conventional marketer nowadays!), I mingled with blockchain-born marketers, so-to-say community managers, or advisors covering marketing and investment together. For a person like me traditionally practised marketing, it was one of the eye-opening moments.
And of course, growth hackers. Startup and digital industry have been in need of growth hackers. So as the blockchain industry.
I think the term sounds very cool so many people like to use it, although it can be easily misleading. It reminds me that ‘social media expert’ used to be a sexy word in 2010 (yes, I was!).
I met some people got a wrong idea about growth hacking and growth marketing in blockchain, so I decided to write about three misconceptions about growth hacking (and growth marketing) in the blockchain industry.
To learn about what the difference between growth hacking and growth marketing is, read this.
Misconception 1: Growth hacking refers to ANY tactics to grow the ‘number.’
Have you ever questioned about how a young blockchain startup accommodated thousands of people in their Telegram or Reddit (or other social media) community? Even if they don’t seem to have built a proper branding yet?
Growing the size of an online community can be time-consuming. As a time-saving solution, some companies utilize the bots that create anonymous accounts for fake followers or engagement activities, i.e. upvote/downvote.
It is one of the black hat marketing tactics, not growth hacking.
Nowadays people know this kind of tactics exists as well. Our online audience has become very smart. Therefore you will lose your actual target audience’s interest and reputation by doing so.
Growth hacking is NOT always about just growing the number.
I do encourage the initial growth of the numbers in a non-targeted way such as asking around the friends. After that, your growth hacking strategy should be towards driving quality followers that can be your business (or coin) supporters.
Misconception 2: Growth marketing is free
“We have grown our community to over 10,000 at a free of charge.”
I feel that it has become a trend that startup CEOs say this kind of statement proudly at conferences as I hear it more often.
Growth hacking can be costly if you consider the entire expenses including resource’s working hours and values created via spill-over effects from your marketing/branding efforts.
When it’s done right, growth hacking can provide you with the cost-effective solution.
Setting up the right goal, rolling out the immediate action items, and measuring the effectiveness of planning the next action items.
And start the process all over again after narrowing down the goal from learnings. The newly-set action items will be highly focused. Hence it will bring the cost-saving solutions to your team.
Misconception 3: Growth marketing in blockchain is all about TELEGRAM
Does the Telegram community size matter?
Yes, for the blockchain companies in the pre-ICO stage. I agree that Telegram is the most effective channel to communicate with the cryptocurrency crowd during the ICO period as it offers handy features like bots, pinned message and edit/reply functions enabling efficiency.
However, for the post-ICO stage, Telegram is one of the channels in the middle of your customer journey funnel, not the end of it.
One of the cryptocurrency investor’s motivations is that they are interested in or working in the company’s industry. That being said, the blockchain-enabled company’s investors could be your prospects or strategic partners.
When rolling out your go-to-market action plans, Telegram community could be at the beginning of your customer journey funnel.
It’s a wrap!
In summary,
- Growth Hacking tactics can drive ‘quality numbers’
- Growth Marketing is ‘cost-effective’
- Telegram adds to the beginning of the Growth Marketing funnel in blockchain
I will write about growth marketing in blockchain regularly moving forward. Stay tuned.
You can find me at:
twitter.com/YureeHong17
linkedin.com/in/yureehong17/
http://hash81.org/
Any other misconceptions about growth marketing in blockchain you’ve experienced? Share your thoughts below!
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