The Blockchain (also) disrupted Com and Marketing ...

But it was (a little) involuntary!

A finding to start. I like slogans like School of Commerce or Com '90s style: "Know-how yes, but especially the Faire-Savoir!". However, if it's easy to make fun of it, you still have to agree that the most beautiful project in the world will not go far without effective communication and calibrated marketing to reach its target.

This subject is even so essential that, most often and since the second half of the twentieth century, companies have outsourced this strategic function, entrusting it to specialized agencies and force and recognizing that the 2000s, the golden age of Internet, have offered these entities unprecedented channels and unexpected power: websites, marketing-mail, SEO, social networks ...

Here for this snapshot, which I would now like to relate to a phenomenon that has not escaped anyone in recent months: the ban on crypto communication (typically ICOs) platforms of some giants of the web:

• Facebook has banned early January crypto ads , "frequently associated with scams."
• Same causes and same consequences for Google from next June.
• End crypto-tweets also on Twitter since April 2.
• Decision a little less publicized, the giant MailChimps newsletter also made known his position on the subject: it's a big no .

It is likely that the official justification is sincere (the protection of the community against the many scams and scam that the small but already lucrative world of crypto is teeming with), but it is also certain that these leader of the already corny "web 2.0" ( who still says that?) found there a way to temporarily suffocate a sector which they feel all the danger vis-à-vis their own "business model"!

"When it's free ... it's you the com"!

The equation is complex: on the one hand, a sector in full boiling, new projects every day, a new ecosystem with multiple potentials, all with huge financing needs (and usually out of the usual banking channels). On the other hand, more and more closed doors prevent the promotion and publicity of these projects on an international scale.

As often, nothing better than a good big crisis to push for creativity and, even though the process has been around for some time, an approach is systematized: the rapid and ex nihilo aggregation of a huge community around projects and the battle order of this community according to a strategy of occupation of the ground of a formidable efficiency.

In short, a precise and fast management of the notion of virality .

(In reality, another powerful tool is also needed in parallel with this quantitative approach , it is the solicitation - and not for the glory - of some of the few hundred "influencers" of the blockchain planet, including one YouTube video or a tweet oriented are likely to send an ICO "to the Moon" ... Sorry for this unbearable suspense, but the subject deserves an article all by itself!).

An important parameter will also be recalled: com and marketing are important budgets , especially for a start-up stammering (we are talking about an average of 5% of the funds , often much more with regard to the subject which requires ultra-marketing. sharp, to a demanding audience).

These combined reasons have created the conditions for a genuine uberization of marketing : no professional com 'agency (or very little, at the very beginning of the project), no solicitation of traditional actors and the start-up is found more in front line in vain requests of the big social networks. No, she sends the thousands of members of her community to do it for her!

Shipwrecked Bounty Campaigners

The techniques to create a plethoric community are not lacking, especially on the subject of cryptos that can give an uninformed eye, the illusion of rapid enrichment.

Thus, an " Airdrop " (free distribution of some tokens) well valued via specialized platforms, it is now likely to swell in a few days Telegram groups and Twitter and Facebook accounts linked to an ICO of tens of thousands of members .

So, of course, to re-speak the commercial language, this audience is not very qualified and most of the time simply opportunistic, mocking as its first ripple of the bottom of the project and its future, as long as the premium of Airdrop is paid to the outcome of the ICO. A form filled in 45 secs, and the next one is already open in the neighbor tab of the browser.

However, a few% of this community will go a little further and participate in what is called a " Bounty Campaign ", for the benefit of the organizers of the ICO.

In exchange for their work force, over a period ranging from several weeks to a few months, these "mercenaries of the com" will become ambassador / representative / Community manager of the brand, all orchestrated by a new function: the Bounty Manager , guardian of the Temple who will distribute directives and bonuses (the latter being also often himself a former "bounty hunter").

For now, the iconic bitcointalk community forum is the main support for these operations .

Traditionally, 2 to 3% of the tokens issue is reserved for these campaigns of a new kind.

On paper, everyone is a winner: start-ups offer virtually free pay for her and participants are given the opportunity to recover tokens, not in exchange for a financial investment but in their time and money. Workforce. If the project works, it's a jackpot, and if (as in 80% of cases according to some sources ) the ICO proves to be sterile, at least the participants in the bounties will have lost only a few hours of their time ...

In fact, there are few guarantees concerning the potential value of tokens (but this is the common lot in terms of crypto), as well as the reality of the payment of premiums (imagine the reliability of the remedies ...) . At the same time, companies can not demand the same quality of investment and production from individuals who are not professionals in the sector, than from an agency held to a contractual performance obligation.

If the campaigns "social networks" (commit to twitter / re-twitter, post or relay on Facebook or Twitter a number of times a week) do not require special skills and bring together the "bulk of the troops", the "content" and translation missions "nevertheless materialize certain limits of the system.

Difficult indeed to have "articles" of a similar quality, or simply similar, the production of specialized journalists, not to mention the publication media with variable audiences (Steemit, personal blogs ...).

Similarly, the translation of marketing content into a dozen languages ​​(a bare minimum for an average project currently), an operation that would cost a fortune otherwise, is unfortunately too often heat the Google Translate servers ...

The results are sometimes atrocious, to the detriment of the credibility of the project, especially concerning the White Paper , a real cornerstone of the development of the company. Its clumsy translation can lead to technical misperceptions, problems of financial scale, or even worse, generate a legal risk due to vagueness regarding the mandatory information surrounding the sale of tokens.

Despite these disadvantages, the time remains for this solicitation of the community to ensure wide dissemination by "capillarity" projects.

This period is intrinsically linked to the adolescence of the sector and will probably undergo profound changes and some professionalization .

Traditional agencies will not remain without reaction. As such, the recent appearance of a branch dedicated to ICOs within the French agency HAVAS , in partnership with Blockchain Partner shows how seriously the subject is taken.