If you’re a social media marketer, you know that one of the key ways to build awareness for your brand is to create engaging and compelling content. But what if you could take things one step further and actually use new technologies to help you promote your brand? Blockchain technology is changing the world, and one of its most interesting applications is in the use of non-fungible tokens, or NFTs. In this blog post, we’ll explore seven different ways that you can use NFTs to help promote your brand. Read on to learn more!
What are NFTs
NFTs or non-fungible tokens are a special type of blockchain-powered digital assets that combine the features of real, unique physical objects with the best features smart contracts have to add. Contrary to other blockchain-based digital assets like cryptocurrency, each NFT is unique, irreplaceable and indivisible, in the sense that a chair or a work of art is both unique and indivisible. They can also only have a single owner at a time, and both the transfer and ownership of the token are recorded and tracked on the blockchain.
These features make NFTs perfect for representing ownership of any asset, real or virtual, in virtual worlds like the emerging metaverses popping up all over the internet. These and other features make NFTs great tools for many different purposes, one of which is a new form of marketing.
How do NFTs work?
NFTs are created on a blockchain platform like Ethereum, and each token is assigned a unique ID. The token’s identity, ownership, and any special feature it may have are stored on the blockchain, where all transactions are recorded publicly. As each transaction involving an NFT is made public and the blockchain is tamper-proof, it becomes possible for users to keep track of their tokens and verify their authenticity at any time.
NFTs operate similarly to standard cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, except that each one is unique and can have only one owner at a time.
In contrast, you can purchase small fractions of Bitcoin. NFTs are managed through smart contracts, which are small pieces of code executed by the blockchain on each transaction.
What can you do with NFTs?
People have come up with all sorts of ways to use NFTs for different purposes, and the possibilities for using them seem to be endless with collectibles having the largest market distribution.
Here’s a shortlist of some things that you can do with NFTs that make them valuable:
- You can collect them.
- You can use them as investments or flip NFTs for a profit.
- You can mint your own NFTs and make money selling them.
- You can mint and sell NFTs to fund a startup.
- You can use NFTs for different marketing purposes like building brand awareness, which is what this post is all about.
7 Ways to use NFTs for brand awareness
Last year, the NFT market grossed a total of nearly $25 billion, with some NFTs of not very impressive works of digital art selling for hundreds of thousands of dollars. So, it’s safe to say that there is a lot of hype around NFTs right now, which means that jumping on the bandwagon will almost surely attract a lot of eyes, no matter how exactly you decide to implement NFTs into your brand’s marketing strategy.
That said, a few use cases have already proven effective for several companies, big and small. Here is a shortlist of some of the most promising ideas:
Table of Contents:
- Partner with NFT artists to create branded digital collectibles
- Encourage user interaction with your brand in the metaverse
- Making digital NFT versions of your brand’s physical products
- Minting physical goods as NFTs
- Offer them as prizes in social media giveaways
- Mint and auction special NFTs
- Turn a part of your brand’s history into an NFT
#1 Partner with NFT artists and auction sites to create branded digital collectibles
Strategic partnerships are a proven textbook method for building brand awareness. In the case of NFTs, partnering with popular NFT artists and auction sites that already have a growing crowd of followers will help you get the word out much faster. Since this is only an emerging trend, it’s important to act soon, especially if you’re in an industry that hasn’t been on the news yet about NFT adoption.
With all the hype around NFTs, the news travels fast every time we see a first mover jump in the space. The Marriott Bonvoy brand benefitted from great media coverage by partnering with TXREK, JVY, and Erick Nicolay, three up-and-coming NFT artists, to create a collection of NFTs they unveiled on December 4 at Art Basel Miami Beach 2021.
If you manage to partner with a recognized NFT artist to create a series of collectible branded NFTs, there’s a good chance that one or several of them could go viral, generating plenty of exposure to your brand. It’s the NFT equivalent of influencer marketing except that, in this case, the influencer is the NFT artist.
#2 Encourage user interaction with your brand in the metaverse
The metaverse is an umbrella term for virtual and augmented realities that allow interaction with other users. It is set to become a unified, 3D virtual world where we can come together to play, work, collaborate and shop. It’s a sort of 3D social media, collaboration space, and online gaming environment rolled into one, which many experts agree will be the future of the internet.
Although Facebook’s rebranding as Meta last year put the spotlight on this emerging trend, it’s been growing for years, particularly with virtual worlds such as WOW and Second Life. Today, numerous platforms like Fortnite, Roblox and Decentraland have thousands upon thousands of active users who spend their time in these platforms meeting with friends and building experiences for others to check out.
Businesses quickly caught on to the potential these platforms offer to connect more deeply with their audiences. From consumer brands like Coca-Cola and Nike to fashion and luxury brands like Balenciaga and Gucci, everyone is trying to become a part of the metaverse.
Through VR technology, you can create and offer immersive and meaningful branded experiences that will burn into your audience’s unconscious mind in a more effective way than traditional advertising.
#3 Making digital NFT versions of your brand’s physical products for the metaverse
Continuing with the metaverse theme, you can use NFTs to sell or give away valuable branded merchandise for users to wear on their avatars or otherwise use in the metaverse. This can be anything from a t-shirt with a logo to actual virtual versions of your real physical products. Or you could even create virtual prototypes of future products and distribute them to users to test out and provide feedback while exposing other metaverse users to your brand.
Through the power of smart contracts, you can even program these NFTs to give these users early access to those new products in the real world once they launch.
#4 Minting physical goods as NFTs
We talked about creating digital versions of your physical products and minting them as NFTs, but you can also do the opposite and turn NFTs into physical products as well. This works by linking an NFT to a physical good or to a service your company provides in the real world, usually by adding a unique QR code to the product, which the user can scan with their mobile phone to claim the NFT.
By tokenizing your products, you can add more value to them in different ways. Think VIP membership tokens, loyalty rewards, collectibles that get you a prize once you complete the collection; you name it!
#5 Offer them as prizes in social media giveaways
Since NFTs are unique, they’re also collectible and can become very valuable in time, which is why they’re so sought-after. However, some NFTs can become very expensive for you to buy, so organizing contests where NFTs are the prize will always attract a crowd, especially on social media.
You can set your contest up so that participants are required to interact with your brand in different ways like answering quizzes, sharing content with their friends or followers and more. You can also brand the NFT you give away so that your company will always be present in the winner’s mind every time they look at or use the digital asset they won.
#6 Mint and auction special NFTs
Anyone can create an NFT from any digital asset (and in some cases from physical assets as well). This process is called minting, and what most people do after they mint is try to sell the NFT or auction it.
Besides the potential to generate revenue from sales, NFTs also have the potential to generate plenty of buzz around your brand if it’s unique or valuable enough. For example, Venice’s Ca’ di Dio, one of the only 5-star hotels to open its doors in Venice last 2021, auctioned a booking of the entire hotel for one night as an NFT on OpeSea last August. The event got a lot of attention, including being cited in all major crypto and NFT websites, thanks to the buzz around NFTs.
#7 Turn a part of your brand’s history into an NFT
Those brands with a strong digital presence will likely have various types of content that mark important milestones in the company’s history. Perhaps you’re a computer games publisher who launched an incredibly popular game in the early days of personal computers. Maybe you launched a video ad campaign that went viral when you published it on YouTube, or maybe you created a viral meme featuring your brand.
Whatever the case, as the rightful owner, you can take that vintage game, that YouTube video or that meme and mint it into an NFT, which you can then auction, sell, or set as the prize of a contest. People will immediately become interested in the possibility to own a piece of your company’s and the internet’s history, similarly to how a collector will do anything to get their hands on an original manuscript from a famous author.
Bottom line
NFTs are a great way to use unique digital assets in new and innovative ways. They can be used for brand awareness, as prizes or giveaways, or even collectibles representing your company’s history. Their possibilities are endless! By combining NFTs with social media, you can create a powerful marketing tool that will help you reach new audiences and promote your brand in ways you never thought possible. So what are you waiting for? Start minting today!
