I had rather made up my mind to write less about Steem and more about food, but after listening to a conversation between @aggroed and @justineh on Sunday, and being inspired by getting back on air with my new MSP show, I thought I would pen to paper and take a stab at this...
There are a few facts I believe we will all agree on...
- Steem needs more people.
- To get more people we need marketing.
- To do marketing effectively we need a marketing plan.
Beyond this the consensus probably begins to falter.
The what, the how, the who and the how much - let alone the where does the money come from - quickly move into stickier waters.
Picking up on the 'who', one answer may well be the Steem Foundation.
That is coming, but not just yet.
And even when it does, I am not sure it will be super optimal just to pile everything on the Foundation.
We can all play a part. We can all contribute. We can all collaborate.
This takes me to the purpose of this post...
To kick start a collaborative Marketing Plan for Steem.
I will layout what might stand as a workable framework to build a plan around. Broad headings, rough ideas, a few pointers of where to start.
Then I ask everyone with an interest in marketing Steem to contribute and make suggestions.
I will synthesise the input and recompile the plan.
With a few iterations hopefully we can come up with a fully workable plan. If any elements can be actioned along the way all the better.
Let's get started...
Who are we targeting?
- Investors
- Developers
- Content creators
- Content consumers
How do we reach each of these?
1. Investors
Investors need to be segmented into large and small. In the context of Steem's market cap perhaps over $100K might be considered in the large investor bracket.
There will be a further differentiation between individual investors and business / corporate investors. Different approaches are likely needed for each.
Possible marketing activities to attract investors...
a) Attendance and presentations at finance oriented crypto conferences
b) PR and advertorial in the crypto / financial press
c) Direct approaches to known crypto investors
d) Production of a 'Steem Investors Pack'
Any other ideas?
Who could work on these ideas?
This will need a team to be formed with the required specialist knowledge. Suggestions to help put this team together might include @theycallmedan, @starkerz, @aggroed, @fyrstikken, @broncnutz, @scaredycatguide and @thecryptodrive.
As well as finance/investment expertise, PR, copywriting and presentation skills will all be needed on the team.
Is this an area where the Steem Business Alliance could take the lead?
How would the work be funded?
The Steem Proposal System as a starting point, but also donations, upvoting and direct pitch to Steemit Inc maybe for specific activities.
2. Developers
This will include both individual developers with ideas for dapps and apps looking for a blockchain to build on, and full businesses with larger and more developed plans.
For both the benefits of developing on Steem will need to be packaged and well presented. These will include easy development environment, strong existing development community, fee-less and fast transactions, ready made audience for market testing and feedback...
Possible marketing activities to attract investors...
a) Attendance and presentations at tech oriented crypto conferences
b) PR and advertorial in the tech crypto and FOSS (free and open-source software) media
c) Running 'hackathon' type events
d) Production of a 'Steem Developers Pack'
Any other ideas?
Who could work on these ideas?
This will need a team to be formed with both development and business knowledge. Suggestions to help put this team together might include @therealwolf, @yabapmatt, @aggroed, @fredrikaa, @themarkymark, @inertia, @eonwarped, @theycallmedan. @starkerz and @thecryptodrive.
As well as development expertise, PR, copywriting, presentation and event planning skills will all be needed on the team.
Is this an area where the Steem Business Alliance could again take the lead?
How would the work be funded?
The Steem Proposal System as a starting point, but also donations, upvoting and direct pitch to Steemit Inc maybe for specific activities.
3. Content Creators
For the recruitment of Content Creators the emphasis of marketing should shift towards the individual apps and dapps, and now also the tribes.
Spending marketing effort to bring creators directly onto steemit.com without a much improved onboarding experience and some sort of formalised mentoring system is likely to be unrewarding because of very low retention rates.
The individual apps and tribes present a much more targeted opportunity for new creator acquisition. They can offer a more refined, more optimal and more supportive onboarding experience that is likely to have significantly higher retention rates.
Steempress has just published its strategy and roadmap for onboarding content creating bloggers en masse. This includes some strong marketing ideas that will hopefully be picked up by other apps and dapps such as an attractive referral scheme.
Marketing efforts to attract content creators should largely be focused therefore on supporting and perhaps co-ordinating the efforts of the dapps, apps and tribes.
This might require the formation of some sort of 'co-ordinating group' to...
a) Ensure good ideas are shared among all dapps, apps and tribes
b) Providing design, copywriting and commercial expertise for the production of publicity material and merchandise
c) Providing PR, copywriting and social media expertise for PR and social media marketing activities
d) Possibly providing guidance in other areas such as legal and event planning
Who could work on these ideas?
Suggestions for this type of co-ordinating advisory group might include @fredrikaa, @paulag, @zord189, @hungryhustle, @exyle, @jongolson, @taskmaster4450, @kay-leclerc, @ivyriane, @zipporah, @carrieallen, @ashtv, @hauptmann, @whatsup...
How would the work be funded?
The Steem Proposal System as a starting point, but also donations, upvoting and direct pitch to Steemit Inc maybe for specific activities.
4. Content Consumers (aka Curators, Readers, Viewers, Players)
As with Content Creators, the recruitment of new 'consumers' on the platform will likely be most effectively done via the individual apps, dapps and tribes.
They will be increasingly better equipped to offer a more targeted and supportive onboarding experience.
However steemit.com will continue to present a broad spectrum catch-all opportunity for new consumer (and creator) recruitment. How this is best served through marketing activities should be revisited after the arrival of Hive Communities and SMTs which should significantly enhance the user experience on steemit.com
In the meantime the emphasis of marketing for new consumers will best be done via the apps, dapps and tribes.
The requirements for some sort of 'co-ordinating group' will intertwine with those for marketing to new content creators.
It will be optimal therefore for that co-ordinating group to serve both marketing efforts which do significantly overlap - many consumers may also be creators.
The Missing Bits...
There are still some obvious 'marketing chunks' to be integrated into this Marketing Plan, including...
a) the use of social media for promotion of all marketing activities
b) merchadise / promotional materials (particularly for events)
c) marketing metrics - what needs to be measured to gauge progress, and how can the data be collected
d) language neutrality - marketing activities should be accessible to as many languages as possible. Non-native English speakers should be involved in all the groups.
Two other important marketing 'elements' that span across more or less all the targets are...
a) Steem Ambassador program - a team to act as the public face of Steem at events and conferences. This needs a post of its own to develop further but obvious candidates with experience in this area include @coruscate, @justineh, @crimsonclad, @starkerz and @anarcotech.
b) Small Grants Fund - the Steem Proposal System is likely not to be suitable for providing small adhoc amounts of money for example for the printing of 100 promotional t-shirts for an event or the purchase of train tickets to take people to speak at a crypto event. The proposal requirements, the timescales and the voting system will be too cumbersome. Therefore some sort of regularly topped up fund of maybe $5000 would be useful to cover small scale expenditure. Could that be built up through donations and post beneficiary rewards?
IN BIG LETTERS - this is not a definitive marketing plan. I am not a marketing expert of any description.
This is just a marker in the sand to get the juices flowing and the contributions incoming.
Pitch in and I will compile.
Thank you. It's 5am and time to sleep.
[ image by @pennsif ]