How to build a community for your Blockchain project

Today, after surviving the wave of the latest hype, the blockchain market is in fundamental change. Yes, public interest during the turbulence in the market has not grown worse than Bitcoin itself in the best of times, but the trend is already noticeable – newcomers go aside while the hype fades, and only crypto-enthusiasts remain.

The same old-timers who started in 2014 or 2017 are still here, and maybe the crypto-evangelists who joined them in 2021. But… there is no more hype.

Although the market is quite high, the lack of hype brings a lot of changes to the game.

At this point, we understand that it is unlikely to just drive traffic on one tap and get a million. It is possible, but the chances are not that great. You have to move differently.

Now any crypto project, especially in Defi, should be built around two magic words – community building. Why? Everything is as simple as that. The community is the most important asset for your product.

The people you bring together will protect your brand. They will show you how to develop your project. They will promote you simply by talking about the product.

And since the community is your number one strength, you need to know how to competently, step by step, gather a loyal audience that will stand up for your brand. And today we want to talk about the most important mistakes made by new founders and ways to fix them. Let’s go!

Define the purpose of community building

Error: all kinds of “Crypto Project Launch Checklists” say that first all you need to do is launch a thousand channels and gather an audience of bots, without questioning why you need this audience.

This is definitely the wrong approach. You don’t need a community for community’s sake. First of all, you need to understand why you need a community. Ask yourself just one question: for what purpose are you gathering people? And this question already includes the following: How will you communicate with them? Where will you lead them? Will it pay off in your communication channels? Look at your project and think about what you are bringing people together for. The point is that the community can play a wide variety of roles.

For example, you can collect it to test your application. Maybe you need a community that will invest in your product on public sale or private sale? Or maybe you even need to create a customer development group? Maybe your project needs a community for everything at once? This also happens. In any case, you need to understand why you are putting together a community, as this will affect the choice of resources, budgets and communication channels

Where do you find your community?

Error: What do “experienced” blockchain marketers say after 2 months of work? You need to create a community everywhere – Facebook, Discord, Twitter, Telegram, Reddit, etc.

To what? Because. Just because other projects do. In the end, you don’t have time to manage all the groups created, the audience is different and completely disjointed, and you rush from corner to corner trying to deliver content at regular intervals.

It is easier to start with one communication channel: Twitter or Telegram. What opportunities do they offer?

Twitter is a great platform and is pretty easy to manage in the first few weeks. You can communicate with your audience and launch news feeds. This platform is designed to bring together a community and can also function as a blog at the same time.

Telegram. Start a Telegram chat, where you want to gather an audience for a specific purpose. Provide slightly different types of content than what you create for Twitter. In general, on each communication channel, provide unique content and lead the audience from one to another.

Well, now it’s time for a bigger format and bigger thoughts – this is where a blog comes in handy. Write about your project, share your vision and provide details about project changes and your plans.

Looking for an audience can waste a lot of time and money. If you are just at the beginning of this task, you can always contact me for help. It never hurts to save money instead of investing in the pursuit of an audience 😉

How to invite people to your community

Error: use all communication channels such as news feeds and with the same content

Why is it wrong?

First, each channel should have its own distinctive style, combining the classics of this particular instrument and the voice of the project.

Secondly, leave the news to TV. The point is that people want to know more about you. They are interested in your ambitions, dreams and how you plan to market and trade in the market. Therefore, it is best not only to post news pictures, but to ask what the audience really wants to see. Invite the public as much as possible to the weekdays of your project and evoke a wide range of emotional reactions.

How? Using interactions. For example, “Come up with an idea for an NFT and get your treats!” or run a flashmob with a call to type Elon Musk 2000 times using #.

Why should you work with one target group?

Mistake: immediately go out to multiple audiences and capture subscribers from Asia, Europe, CIS, etc. As a result, you end up with a diverse audience that is impossible to manage.

What is the right way? Start with one geo.

For example, if you think your audience is mostly in Asia, don’t immediately go into Europe or the CIS. Work with one GEO, one target audience, and gather people with roughly the same mentality so that your community is strong, whole and cohesive. Otherwise, it will be very difficult for you to gather these people around your project.

The best approaches to audience gathering

Error: shoot sparrows recklessly. “…A checklist says you need to invite, so we’ll do that until we get 50,000 people.”

No. You have to collect the audience point by point.

The best option is to take a few influencers (most likely not for free) and infect them with your idea. Make them your brand ambassadors so that they regularly post content about you and provide a small CTA, and send your audience to Telegram or Twitter.

What else? Many people underestimate media buying in the same telegram. But this tool works almost perfectly. Create native ad posts in other groups, and voila – you get more audience.

Traffic. A good old method of smart funnels and simple journey maps to turn an interested audience into a loyal community. Start traffic with the words “We are gathering a community for project X”, then you will direct the audience to the landing page, and already there you will write proven messages: “Hey! We are gathering a community to make our project even better, but without you, friends, we can’t do it. So subscribe and we’re already packing goodies for you!” On the other hand, you can drive traffic directly to Telegram or Twitter as an alternative.

We have been working with traffic for several years now and have managed to gather a community this way for a number of crypto projects. If you need a detailed guide on how to use customer journey maps and drive traffic through them to quickly build an audience, write to us with a request. We will explain everything and give illustrative examples.

How to communicate with the audience

Error: after creating a community, you invite people who communicate pragmatically and dryly with the audience. This is pretty bad.

How to do it right: The best option is when the founders themselves communicate with the public. Think about it – you’ve created a project, you have a small audience, and no one can communicate with them better than you. Chat, post, comment, take videos, after all. But this is only for now. As soon as you know the audience and understand how to communicate with it – immediately train the community manager and step away from 90% of the communication, you have a lot of other work to handle 🙂

The most important thing is that you never outsource your community managers. Only within the team. And you need to cultivate a community manager for a long time and effectively, infecting him with your ideas and ambitions. Only then will he be able to properly communicate with the audience and spread your philosophy to them. Yet an outsider will never understand and love your project as much as a person from your team. This affects communication, without which it is impossible to build a good relationship with the public.

Summary

Form small, cozy communities. Don’t chase millions right away. I have already seen many cases when small projects with 1000 people closed investment rounds for half a million dollars. How is it? They had a loyal community where people shared information, supported the project and just loved it.

Forget useless checklists from 2017 – they don’t work anymore. Communicate with your audience, spark them with your ideas, and always ask what they want to see on your channels.

If you don’t know how to move or you get stuck at some point, it doesn’t matter. Any difficulties can be solved, and as we have already shown above, there are many tools for promotion.

There is a chance that any entrepreneur can spend their entire budget chasing the wrong goals. Anyone without proper experience in the area may accidentally encounter such a situation. To prevent this, you can get help from an experienced professional who has done it before. If you feel you need help, don’t hesitate to contact me. Together we will make everything happen.