“Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half.” – John Wanamaker
In today’s rapidly evolving marketing landscape, traditional methods such as billboards and mailers face an attribution problem. It is challenging to measure the success of a specific medium or campaign accurately. On the other hand, social media platforms have solved the attribution problem but have become increasingly cost-ineffective in the fiercely competitive world of consumer brands. As marketing strategies continue to shift, social tokens and NFTs are emerging as intriguing but unproven methods to engage customers and drive brand loyalty.
The rise of social media platforms revolutionized marketing by providing intricate details and targeting capabilities for reaching consumers. Brands of all sizes capitalized on these platforms, refining their customer acquisition costs to a science. In fact, estimates suggest that as much as 50% of all venture capital is poured directly into tried and tested strategies like running Facebook and Google ads. Unicorns like Clearbanc even emerged to fund this specific use of capital. However, as more capital flooded social media marketing platforms, the unit economics enjoyed by early adopters began to disintegrate.
Despite not all traditional brands having fully transitioned to social media marketing, the strategy has become so competitive that campaigns are turning negative-yielding. Consequently, many brands are reconsidering traditional marketing mediums. Despite the attribution problem, these mediums still provide a positive expected yield on campaigns. Marketing teams are now actively exploring various options to bring their customer acquisition costs back to sustainable levels. This is where social tokens and NFTs come into play.
By utilizing wallet-level data, marketing teams can build loyal communities around brands through social tokens and NFTs. These innovative tools provide an alternative to targeting customers based solely on internet activity. For years, a combination of tokens, NFTs, Discord, and Twitter has been used to build blockchain brands, some of which have become the largest in the world. This success has piqued the interest of major marketing teams, leading many to consider implementing social tokens and NFTs as their new customer acquisition and retention strategy over the next 12 months.
In a world where the effectiveness of marketing strategies is constantly evolving, it is crucial for brands to adapt and explore new avenues. Social tokens and NFTs present an exciting opportunity to engage customers in unique and meaningful ways, fostering brand loyalty in an increasingly competitive market. As marketing teams navigate this new frontier, only time will tell if these unconventional methods will become the next game-changer in the industry.
