Three ways NFTs can enhance corporate events

Dennie is a Web3 Futurist, Professor and CTO at Digiphy. He advises several Web3 projects and is the author of the book, Web3 and Society.

NFTs have gained immense popularity in the last year. Major brands such as Adidas, Nike, McDonald’s, Coca-Cola and Prada are investing heavily in integrating NFTs into their traditional business marketing strategies. This is key for mass adoption as everyday consumers will now have access to blockchain NFTs through their favorite brands. Such experiences can facilitate more engaging customer interactions across physical and digital channels. This presents a very exciting opportunity for brands to connect with this new generation of customers.

NFTs have also found their way into event marketing. Major conferences like Consensus have included NFT giveaways for event attendees since 2019. Attendees receive a special email link to claim the NFTs and can claim the reward at any time during or after the conference. More recently, the Academy Awards jumped on the NFT bandwagon by awarding NFTs to their winners. The Oscars teamed up with NFT marketplace Rarible to create exclusive art for their NFT awards. Such NFT-driven event experiences will only increase as event organizers increase their adoption of new event technologies.

Businesses can also benefit from NFTs by incorporating them into their own events. Here are three ways NFTs can supercharge corporate events.

1. NFTs as tickets: NFT tickets are access cards that exist on the blockchain as an NFT. They provide access to live or virtual events.

2. NFTs as rewards: NFT rewards are exclusive blockchain-based rewards for event participants that are awarded upon completion of a goal.

3. NFTs as souvenirs: NFT souvenirs are digital NFT souvenirs that event attendees can keep with them forever.

There have been many successful NFT events in recent years. For example, the US hosted Gary Vee’s VeeCon in May 2022. The conference made history by being the first large-scale event to be exclusively ticketed for NFTs. Only the holders of Veefriend NFTs were allowed access to the event and tickets were not available for purchase to the general public.

Canada has also hosted many unique NFT event experiences. In 2021, the Toronto Raptors launched their own NFT collection titled 6ix Keys. These digital artworks granted holders exclusive benefits such as rare autographed souvenirs, VIP experiences and more. The collection contained many different types of NFTs that granted privileges based on their rarity.

Another leader in the Canadian NFT event space is the Vancouver Bar Crawl. The event has successfully incorporated NFT souvenirs into its nightlife events and was recently ranked Canada’s #1 Bar Crawl. It also announced a collaboration with sound artist Droktr to create more unique NFT audio experiences.

NFTs provide many benefits when successfully integrated into event marketing. In the near future, NFTs can be used as event tickets to offer exclusive rewards and also provide souvenirs to event attendees. Such experiences are still in their infancy, but have great potential, and I believe mass adoption of NFTs will enable more NFT event experiences. Companies will be able to integrate such experiences into their marketing strategies and attract this new generation of customers.

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