Where Can I Promote My NFT? (The Ultimate Guide)

Need to promote your new NFT project, but not sure where to start?  Check out this ultimate guide.

How To Think About Promoting Your NFT

Consider Your Impact On The Space

Before we dive into all the places you can promote your NFT let’s touch on what it means to build and launch an NFT project at this pivotal moment in the growth of Web3.

If you’re hanging around NFTs on Twitter Spaces then it probably seems like everyone has already launched an NFT project. Rest assured, this is a false reality. 

The NFT space is still just getting started and anything is possible. I would guess most of the biggest projects of this decade haven’t even launched yet. 

In fact, if the biggest projects of the 2020s have launched already then I’d say the space is doomed to fail. NFTs are about creativity and innovation so keep that in mind as you build your project. 

No matter what anonymous Twitter pundits may say, we’re still early and the playbook for what works in Web3 and what doesn’t is in our hands. 

With great power comes great responsibility! 

If any one reading this releases a crappy rug-pull project don’t go tagging this article as your inspiration. We’re not co-signing on to that. 

So please use this information to release projects based on your art, your ideas, creativity, and inspirations.

Ok, let’s get down to business.

Plan Your NFT Project Like You’d Plan A Business

Just like promoting any type of product or service you need to develop an understanding of your market, your offer, and your pricing. 

All these factors that contribute to how effective your overall marketing campaign will be no matter where you choose to promote.

Research The Market

Treat your NFT launch exactly like you’d treat any business at this stage. Spend time researching the market and building up your plan. Get to know your demographic of buyers on a deep level before you try to sell them anything.

For example, the buyer for a photography NFT project may not be the same as a buyer for an anime NFT project. Even if a person collects both photography and anime they may have totally different buying psychologies around how they collect in each niche. 

Find some collectors of similar work and talk to them about what they like and don’t like about their purchases and the market at large. 

You may learn some game changing information during the research phase that ends up making or breaking your entire project. 

In addition to researching who your target collector is, take a look at other launches in the space that were successful and try to reverse engineer what they did well and what you can improve upon. 

If you’re in the NFT space for the long haul then doing research shouldn’t bother you.

Prepare For Any Outcome

As you begin to put together your launch, make a plan for what you’ll do in the event of the different outcomes. 

If your project is a hit, what comes next? Are you prepared to fulfill the roadmap and utilities you promised? Do you have a plan for your website or discord growing 10x in size overnight? 

This line of thinking applies more to PFP communities than smaller editions and 1/1 arts but it’s good to think through the next phases of your project.

And on the other hand, if the launch flops are you going to try again? 

Don’t take it personally if you don’t become the next BAYC (Bored Ape Yacht Club), most of our projects won’t hit that trajectory within a year of launching.

Just be mentally, emotionally, and strategically prepared for success as well as failure!

Create A Schedule And Stick To It

Schedule out each step in your launch, give yourself enough time to execute on every item of your plan. 

Even well organized launches are hectic, deadlines get pushed back, content takes time to develop, your website gets overloaded, etc. 

Don’t work against yourself by being sloppy around the factors you have full control over. Keep a calendar of the launch and update it as deliverables change. This will help to ensure you and your teammates are all working with the same end in mind. 

These are just a few things to keep in mind as you get into the fine details of your marketing plan.

Where can I promote my NFT? (Online Sources)

In this section we're going to review exactly where to promote your NFT online and what types of content projects are using to market their projects. 

We’ll discuss which platforms are allowing for paid advertisements and promotions and go over some basic strategies projects are using to court collector attention.

While I’ll try to hit on every major marketing outlet, there’s no way I’ll be able to break down the pro’s and con’s of every strategy projects are using. (Maybe in an update to this piece we’ll dive deep into some launch case studies.)

One more thing to note, I don’t recommend utilizing every strategy listed here simultaneously. 

This is likely a waste of money and time.

Develop a plan that you think your specific buying demographic will respond well to and stick with it. If you’re not sure what will work, consider testing a range of options, and then go with the ones that yield the best results.

Alright, on to the marketing channels!

Twitter

The NFT market lives and dies on Twitter right now. It’s by far the most popular channel with the most daily active market participants. Almost every project that’s launched in the last six month’s has utilized Twitter in some way. 

Even after a project launches and has an active discord, Twitter is still the best place to bring new eyeballs into the community. 

The two main places you can promote on Twitter is in your Feed or on Twitter Spaces. 

The Feed

The Twitter feed is an exercise in organized chaos. Twitter’s UI has remained simple and fairly minimalist, rectangular with thin lines separating Tweets. This provides apt balance to the absolute randomness of the content of our feeds themselves.

Depending on who you follow you might get workout tips, followed by NFT news, then memes, and then a cool video that’s being retweeted - you get the point! 

It’s absurd that we’ve all just accepted this as the norm, but it is reality. So keep this in mind as you write tweets, especially announcements!

Here’s a rundown of the different types of Tweets you can write to promote your NFT:

Announcement Tweets

Anytime you are announcing something new to your following. This could be about your project launch, a peak at your artwork or creative process, an upcoming Twitter Space, etc. Make sure you get the details out in an easy to digest format. 

I usually will selectively use CAPS or an emoji in these types of tweets to catch some extra attention. 

When you do have an announcement that you are promoting, don’t feel bad about sending out follow up tweets announcing the same information. People use twitter at all times of the day and sometimes tweets get lost in our feeds.

Informational Tweets/Threads

Informational tweets or threads can follow up announcements. These tweets usually break down a more complex idea like how an aspect of your project will work. These are necessary to getting information out to your network and also are great places to engage with your community. 

Naturally your following will ask questions and you can reply to them in the thread. This does help increase your organic views on the tweet and can also fill in the info gaps of your original message.

Hype Tweets

In contrast to the above styles of tweets, Hype tweets contain almost no information but try to convey as much value and thus hype as possible. They can be incredibly short and purposely vague. 

A lot of projects will tweet out hype like: “Soon.” Or 🚀🚀🚀🚀 along with a pre-reveal version of their NFT. 

If you have been building up your community and they know a launch is coming, these types of tweets can be effective for getting tons of engagement and growing your following on Twitter and Discord. 

Of course if no one knows about your project and has no reason to care you are just sending your hype out into the void and you might feel a bit foolish. 

Build your level of hype organically through creating something valuable that people will naturally be excited about.  Then you can go vague when you’d like to create some suspense. 

A subcategory of "Hype Tweets" are Hype Memes/Taglines. I’m using a more general definition of meme here as in an idea that spreads throughout a community than the popular visual meme formats we use online. Crypto loves memes in all forms from Pepes to copypastas. But projects also use memes to promote their brands and spread ideas. 

If you’re launching a project consider how you’ll use these types of memes to grow your brand. Some examples are “Ape Follows Ape.” “We Love The Cats!” A lot of these memes are interchangeable between communities but if you can put your own spin on them and add something to the culture it could be valuable.

Giveaways & Contests

NFT Giveaways and Contest are one of the most popular promotional strategies projects use to build up hype and engagement during their launches. 

Most giveaways are either of an NFT from the project, a different more popular project, or of a Whitelist spot for the upcoming launch. 

(Note: Sometimes projects do give away crypto!) 

Usually to win a giveaway you need to do some "grinding" for the project to raise engagement metrics either on Twitter or Discord. This means RTs, tagging friends, replying. All these tactics are attempts to “hack” the algorithm and get the community more visibility in people's feeds. 

I think giveaways are often overused and can come off as spam, but they’re effective at keeping your community engaged as you approach your mint phase.

Note On Whitelists - We could write an entire article on the current discourse around Whitelists and the politics around having people grind in discords and on twitter for spots. But we don’t have time for that here. 

Whitelists/Allowlists simply exist in the space right now for better or worse and many projects are utilizing them as a means to build up their early communities and ensure a strong NFT launch. 

Paid Promo Accounts

There are accounts on Twitter that have large followings in the NFT Space that will promote your project for fees. I look at these accounts as ways to quickly ramp up engagement but if I was launching a project I won’t rely on them. 

These "influencers" or groups (if they’re a team/multiple accounts) may not have the right following for your project. Unless you speak with other accounts who’ve used their services there’s no way to know how effective they ultimately are.

To me, it’s not the most authentic tactic, but I wouldn’t say I’m above experimenting with it. It’s hard to get enough eyeballs even on a good project in a crowded market place and sometimes you need a little extra firepower.

These accounts charge for services like RTs, pinning your project on their account for a period of hours or days running giveaways for you and adding your project as their PFP also for a period of time.

Paid Twitter Ads

Then there's paid Ads!  Yes, paying money to get your tweets and content sponsored on the platform.

Can you even use Twitter Ads to promote NFTs?

I believe so but I want to strongly caution you before doing so. Twitter has been changing its policies around what you can and can’t do on their ad platform and it’s unclear where they stand with crypto and NFT related content.

I’ve had several accounts blocked from running ads because I was promoting NFTs and Twitter support gave me no feedback around the specifics of their policies and just ran me in circles. 

This led me to believe that NFT ads were forbidden on the platform… until I started seeing new NFT ads marketed to me as recently as yesterday. I honestly can’t tell you exactly what is in bounds and out of bounds for them at this time.

Regardless, now I have a personal beef with Twitter's customer support at this point and I hope it’s resolved soon. If you do decide to run paid ads be extra careful and seek out a Twitter Ads consultant/expert if you are unsure of what to do.

Another note on paid promotion: Some people in the NFT space are very against any type of paid promotion so if you go this route be aware you may be turning some people off.

I am not against it personally given that we trade value and attention all the time whether or not currency is exchanged. Just a few weeks ago we were watching SuperBowl ads hoping to catch a glimpse of a Bored Ape, so it’s a bit hypocritical to say paid promotion is against the ethos of Web3. 

Twitter Spaces

Twitter Spaces are live rooms where Host & Co-host(s) can bring up additional speakers to have an open discussion on any topic they desire. Anyone is free to join a room and listen into the discussion, and even request to speak. NFT Twitter Spaces are going 24/7 all across the world.

Spaces has become an excellent way to learn about the NFT industry live, meet other participants, shill your projects, and make friends. 

When it comes to marketing your project, Twitter Spaces are a great way to bring attention to your work and grow your following. Anytime I’ve spoken in a Twitter Space, I gain followers. Sometimes I even gain a few followers just for being in a large room.

It’s an excellent and free way to achieve some organic growth onto your accounts. 

Within Twitter Spaces there’s a few different types of rooms to be aware of:

Influencer Rooms

Influencer Rooms or Influencer Shows are rooms run by influential members of the NFT space like the Shiny Show, Rug Radio, and the GM Show. These rooms occur regularly often at a set day and time and attract large audiences. They often feature guests like project founders or IRL Celebrities who are getting into the space. They are well organized and are closer to podcasts with a live call-in feature than anything else.

A lot of these rooms started out on Clubhouse before Twitter Spaces took off and the hosts that run them are OGs in the space. I call these people true influencers because they put in a lot of time and work to understand and build the space so their opinions are valued and their taste is respected.

Connecting with these influencers and getting them to host you in a space can bring a lot of attention to your project especially during your mint or right after you sell out. I have personally learned a lot in these rooms and try to pop into them whenever I have some spare time.

Shill Rooms

Shill Rooms are exactly what they sound like. The hosts will bring up different speakers to shill their projects to the other members in the room who are all waiting to also shill their own bags. I don’t love these rooms, but they’re a bit of a necessary evil. 

They’re great places to practice your elevator pitch and meet some other early-stage project founders. 

What I don’t like is everybody is shilling (duh) and are typically out to gain as much attention for themselves as possible. 

However, that’s the expectation in a shill room so it’s not like you don’t know what you’re in for. 

They can feel a little bit like open mic comedy night where the audience is entirely other comics and a few significant others who came along for free drinks. 

Caveats aside, these rooms can be great supportive places and learn more about other projects and get practiced at pitching. Give them a try and see how you feel afterwards.

Alpha Rooms

Alpha Rooms are similar to Shill Rooms except people are typically talking about projects other than the ones they’ve created. If a project has a launch upcoming or a community has some new developments then it might be discussed in an Alpha Room chat. 

It’s hard to use these rooms to promote directly, but it’s worth it to join some and see what the conversation is like. This can help you understand what’s exciting collectors about other projects and you can use that to your advantage.

Casual/Chill Rooms

I love a good casual or chill room! I have a few friends that will launch a space from time to time just to hang out with whoever’s around for an hour or so. We laugh, catch up, share memes and talk shop. What’s cool is that these rooms are all public so new people can join at any time and get connected to our communities. It’s also a great place to meet friends of friends and extend your network of trusted people in the space. 

Remember these are chill rooms so no need to hard sell anyone, just be personable and you’ll make friends who will be interested in what you’re up to.

Project Town Halls/AMAs

Once a project gets off the ground they may run a regular community space or an AMA with a founder. Town Halls & AMAs also happen during a project’s launch phase and are a great way to gather your core community and distribute key launch information to them before you open up a Whitelist or Public Mint. 

Ok we’ve covered a ton of bases on Twitter, let’s move on to the "rest of the internet."

Other Social Platforms

NFTs seem to be taking over the conversation everywhere you look these days (at least for me.) In the last several months I’ve noticed a lot more NFT promotion and content related to the industry and projects on platforms other than Twitter. I think that trend is only going to continue as the industry booms and new people onboard into space.

Instagram

Before NFTs, Instagram was my biggest platform and even though I had a Twitter, I hated the site! Once I became immersed in the NFT community my feelings towards Twitter changed completely and I’ve been enjoying my time there.

I still spend a lot of time on Instagram and it’s probably the second best platform for NFT promotion right now given how visual most NFTs are.

What’s great about Instagram is that a lot of visual artists and brands already have an established presence there and that gives them an advantage when launching their NFT communities.

One major downside, in my opinion, is that it’s owned by Meta/Facebook and there’s a lot of negative baggage there.

It feels like organic growth on the platform has decreased tremendously in recent years and a lot of artists I know are beyond frustrated. Still, I’m logging plenty of time on the platform daily and I haven’t stopped promoting my comic @Goofyfroot there.

If you are going to add Instagram to your NFT marketing strategy I think it can be very effective especially if you do have a built-in community there.

Here’s a breakdown of how I’ve been seeing NFTs promoted on Instagram so far:

Native Content

This includes any original content you post to your Feed, Stories, or Reels.

Reels by far seem to get the best reach on Instagram these days but take more effort to create than Stories. However Reels do get the best engagement and are the only way to share video that plays automatically when you share them to Stories.

I have seen artists posting up their NFTs and talking about what they’re up to in the space. 

One account I like is @Max.the.Miata because he spends the time to educate his audience about NFTs in general and his presence feels super positive.

NFTs aren’t beloved by all and sometimes for good reason, but people like @Max.the.Miata are doing good work to build kind and supportive communities.

I don’t want to get too deep in the weeds on native Instagram content because really the sky is the limit. 

Anything you can represent visually in a static image, in video - live or animated, you can push to the platform. 

To reiterate one of my original points, if you have an audience or community on the platform bring them in on your NFT plans. I’ve taken the time to post about my discord community as a way to move my existing non-nft fans into the nft space. A lot of people are eager to get involved but are looking for that friendly on-ramp.

Of course, if you don’t have an audience to work with you can still promote on Instagram with native content, but I would focus my approach on hitting popular NFT hashtags and releasing new content on a consistent schedule.

Promotion via Other Accounts

There are several accounts that post industry news about notable projects and launches. These are accounts like:

• @Metav3rse
  
  
• @nftnow
  
  
• @nftpays

I don’t believe these accounts do deals for promotion but rather act as news aggregators with an active Instagram presence. 

If your project is doing something unique in the NFT space then they might be interested in including you in their coverage, but they usually don’t cover any projects that haven’t blown up.

Paid Shill Accounts

These are the accounts the immediately comment on any post that hashtags #nfts or other web3 related tags. They feel very spammy and I have not heard of a single notable project having success with these, but hey they exist, maybe they’ll work for you. Bottomline: DYOR

Promos in the DMs

If you’ve interacted with any NFT or web3 related posts the odds are high that you’ve been getting tons of spam DMs from projects looking to shill to you. 

These messages come from bot accounts and often you’ll get the same message from several accounts at once. Personally I absolutely hate these and block every message they send, but someone somewhere is paying these botters to shill their projects and having decent success.

I’ve checked out the discords of some of these spam-bot projects and they do have numbers, so in terms of growing a community it must work. 

It’s not for me and I think will lead to disaster in the long term, but from a purely technical perspective it’s out there.

Paid Promotion

The last aspect of IG promotion is running paid ads on the platform from the Facebook Ads Manager (IG also has its own native ads module now). 

I believe these ads could be effective if the content and offer is strong, but I personally don’t have experience in using it. 

If anyone has success running NFT ads on Instagram reach out to me on Twitter @goodgreatgrossman I’m curious to what tactics have been successful for you.

TikTok

I think TikTok is one of the most underrated platforms and it’s going mainstream this year. I’ve heard from other marketers that it has Facebook 2007 vibes and that’s a huge indicator that it’s about to have its moment.

TikTok has been driven by influencers up until this point but the platform is fairly democratic in terms of what content gets pushed to the FYP (“For You Page”).

Here are a few ideas on how you can leverage the platform for your NFT launch:

Influencer Content

TikTok is highly influencer driven and if you can partner your project with a relevant influencer who also has an audience knowledgeable about NFTs then you can borrow their clout and receive a boost to your own native marketing.

I’ve seen a few projects do promos with TikTok influencers and it’s been effective to drive new eyeballs to their NFTs. Of course these can be done in a cash-grabby way so be careful to do your research on the audience you’re looking to attract and who they value as an influencer. The best relationships are always win-win and feel as organic as possible.

Informational Content

Like on Instagram, TikTok is an excellent platform to educate an audience. There are already tons of accounts educating their audiences about other topics from personal finances, fitness, and politics, there’s no reason why you couldn’t use it to educate your audience about NFTs and also promote the projects you’re building. 

Sharing knowledge is valuable and one thing TikTok does particularly well is pushing "valuable" content to the top of the algorithm. 

Entertainment Content

Entertaining content is also considered valuable as we spend a lot of our "down time" on social media these days. 

If you know how to make people laugh or inspire them with your content then you have the ability to use that platform to promote your NFTs. Now, how this can be done is open to interpretation.

For me, I would love to make more animations with my comic book characters. This would be promoting my brand overall and could lead to people becoming my fans and learning about my NFT projects. 

I could also see a creator using their NFTs in a subtler way like displaying them in the background of other content they’re already creating. I like the idea of NFT projects blending more seamlessly into our culture.

I know TikTok is going to go mainstream within the next 24 months and it’s going to be an important platform for media in general going forward.

LinkedIn

Along with TikTok I think LinkedIn is also flying under the radar as a marketing and promotional platform for NFTs. 

What’s unique about LinkedIn is the type of content that works well there is more behind the scenes than front-facing content. What I mean is I’d probably use LinkedIn to break down a recent marketing campaign that I launched on Twitter or TikTok versus trying to run that content on the platform. 

On LinkedIn people are having conversations about the inside baseball of their industries and are actively recruiting employees and professional connections. My prediction is that a lot of the discussion around NFTs from a technological and industry disruption standpoint will take off on LinkedIn over the next year.

If this type of content is something you think can benefit your pursuits in the NFT industry then I recommend you take advantage of the organic reach found on LinkedIn it won’t last forever.

Facebook

We can’t talk about online marketing without hitting on everybody’s favorite least favorite platform. Fifteen years ago they invented social media as we know it but now their vibe is much of a Steve Buscemi “Hello fellow kids” meme. 

I know a lot of people who’ve left the platform recently and I’ve thought about doing the same, but have I? No. I still check my newsfeed at least once a day to catch up with a few connections and groups I do enjoy there.

Maybe you feel the same way… and maybe 2 Billion other active users do too. Love it or hate it, Facebook is not going anywhere and they seem intent on being an active player in the Metaverse. 

That means users promoting NFTs on their service is in their best interest too.

They’ve shared some loose plans at rolling out features allowing users to mint their own NFTs but nothing substantial has been announced just yet.

For now, you can use their ads platform to promote your projects. I’ve seen a few promoted posts recently for PFPs but to be honest I did not find them compelling. Maybe your projects will catch my eye instead.

A Warning About NFT Hate: Facebook has all the friends you never want to see in real life, the exes, the deadbeat roommates, and middle school frenemies.

There are also likely to be a lot of people that hate NFTs with a passion but couldn’t explain the first thing about how they actually work. If you choose Facebook, just be prepared to receive some salty comments from unsupportive people you used to know.

YouTube

Youtube is yet another platform that I think has a ton of potential as an NFT promotional channel, but I am not seeing a lot of projects creating content for the platform just yet. 

What I am seeing is Youtube serves as a content distribution channel for information and analysis content and influencers who discuss the industry in depth. 

You have popular Youtube channels like:

• DCLBlogger
  
  
• BanklessDAO
  
  
• Ash Robins

who discuss the in's and out's of the industry but they generally aren't used for direct promotion unless they’re plugging an in-house project.

We’re not seeing projects like Doodles or Cool Cats putting out YouTube content on their own. At least not yet.

This is a missed opportunity and something I bet we’re going to see starting to happen by the end of the year.

Eventually some of the projects promising animated series as part of their project utility will likely end up on the platform, but I think animated advertisement or promotional content will become a future trend as well. (Similar to TikTok.)

The macro trend I’m betting on is the barrier to entry for projects will keep going up as the industry gets more saturated and the market gets more tightfisted with thier dollars. 

The halcyon days where a BAYC can come out of nowhere are over. It’s now the era of smart and strategic launches.

Discord Communities

Almost every project uses Discord to grow and manage their community, but it’s also become popular to promote new projects within Discord itself. 

Personally, I am not totally in love with Discord as a community platform for NFTs. 

Discord wasn’t created with NFT or Defi communities in mind and there’s some drawbacks to the platform like scams, spam, and poor UI. What I do like about Discord is that it feels more like a party than a work communication tool like Slack.

I know eventually someone will create a serious Discord competitor on the blockchain that will change the game for project community management, but until that day, it’s the marketplace’s choice.

Discord Shill Channels

A lot of projects have a dedicated channel for members to shill their other projects. Promoting in these channels feels like another low-value effort where people go to shill their own bags without adding much value. 

If you are really respected in a particular community then you might be able to leverage that position into a shill post if done tactfully and sporadically but communities are sensitive to anyone who’s just there for a quick buck.

Cold DMs

This is another spammer tactic, but again some projects may have luck with it. 

I absolutely don’t recommend this one because a lot of scams will DM you on discord so the channel is already super low trust. I feel like I have to include it for the sake of completeness, but I never click on discord links in my DMs even from people I know and trust. I will usually message them on a second channel to confirm they weren’t hacked before clicking any links from friends. 

It’s just not worth it to comprise your server or wallet.

A lot of the growth in discord communities comes from outside the platform from Twitter but once a community gets off the ground people will use it as a platform to promote their other projects.

Telegram Groups

Telegram groups are similar to Discord communities, but the UI of Telegram doesn’t allow for channels for threads. 

With just one chat stream, it’s all about the conversation that’s happening at the moment.

I’m part of a few Telegram groups involved with Defi and NFTs, before I got into Discord communities they took up a lot more of my time. 

Now I pop in occasionally to see what they’re up to, but it feels like Twitter and Discord have taken over the bulk of the market’s attention. 

One group I’m part of is focused on people in my city and members will post event flyers to that group. It’s fun because people meet up IRL and make deeper connections at different meetups. 

I know there are some large and very active Telegram chats and members will shill projects there, but the same rules to shilling in Discord apply. If you’re not providing the community with value on a regular basis your shills will likely be ignored or lead to your accounts being banned.

Paid Ads On Industry Sites

There is a growing list of industry sites that run paid ads for NFT projects that are launching. I can’t give you an exhaustive list of these sites but if you’re active in the space you’ve probably noticed them on a few.

If you are going to use paid ads in general it’s all about the quality of the traffic. Within NFTs, placing your ads on industry sites like Cryptoslam.io is definitely your best bet. 

That said, I haven’t used this method of promotion myself so I have no idea what the costs for placements are. Given the amount of quality traffic these sites get I’d  be prepared to pay a hefty fee. If you do have experience running paid ads on any NFT sites I’d be curious to know more about the economics involved and your results. Send me a DM on Twitter @goodgr8grossman.

Podcasts

I wanted to do a separate section on Podcasts separate from Twitter Spaces and Youtube because they really are a unique form of media despite having a lot of crossover with them.

I do discover most of the NFT podcasts I follow on either Twitter or Youtube but I often will listen to them on Spotify or Apple Music.

Not all podcasts host guests who are promoting NFT projects but some do regularly. A few examples of these are:

• NFP - the Nonfungible Podcast
  
  
• The Outer Realm
  
  
• Overpriced JPEGs from the Bankless Network
  
  
• 4Thangs hosted by GM

What I like about the shows I just named is that they’ve been in NFTs before the mania began and they didn’t just start their shows to cash in on the current hype cycle. 

Even if we hit an NFT Winter these creators likely won’t stop what they’re doing because they aren’t in it for a quick cash grab but rather to support the culture that’s building. 

These shows take the time to interview artists both large and small and that’s another value I align with in NFTs. Discovering new artists is important and these shows are a great way to help unknown but talented artists build their platforms.

Of course these are just four examples of podcasts and I know I’m missing out on some other amazing shows.

If you can get a guest spot on a podcast that covers NFT projects you can earn new followers from their audience. If you’re planning to reach out to any of the shows I listed above, be respectful. 

These hosts are in high demand and have their own projects going on, if you’re going to approach them make sure your project is original and meaningful and not just another crappy bored cat doodle punk derivative. 

Remember, we want to push the boundaries of the space, but not the hosts.

Other Places to Promote Your NFT (Offline and IRL)

Now that we've covered online sources extensively it’s time to remind you there’s actually still a life outside of the metaverse. (At least for now…)

We may have been stuck inside for the last two years due to the global pandemic, but now that more events are coming back and cities are returning to life there are tons of great ways to promote what you’ve been up to in the NFT space IRL (In Real Life).

Events

Twitter Spaces are cool but so much connection happens non-verbally and talking face to face is still the best.

Crypto, Defi & NFT Conferences 

NFT Conferences like NFT.NYC, ArtBasel in Miami, and Eth Denver have been great places for projects both large and small to promote. 

Bigger established projects have been creating a presence for these events by throwing after parties and satellite events that go all out like BAYC did in NYC and Miami. 

Gutter Cat Gang and Doodles both have big showing during Art Basel with multiple days of events for holders and guests. With SXSW around the corner 

You don’t need to compete with those projects and throw an expensive party to get attention and promote your project at an event. 

Simply by showing up and being authentic with the people you meet can go a long way to making connections in the space. 

Events are a great time to connect with people you’ve been following online and look up. Almost everyone in NFTs is super approachable and wants to help other people if they can. 

I remember meeting Spottie Wifi after his performance in Miami and I even gave him a copy of my comic book. He  stuck around to hang out with the rest of the Gutter Cat Gang for a while after his show.

In between throwing a massive rager on and simply going to make new friends there’s a lot you can do to promote while in person. 

Here’s a few ideas ranging from higher to lower cost:

Sponsor Something For The Event

This option ranges in price but is definitely less than a full blown yacht party. You can soon sponsor part of an event and get your logo on their official marketing materials. Events typically have a few tiers of sponsorship so the costs may not be as steep as you think for a smaller event. You can pitch them on sponsoring the event flyers, promo t-shirts, or larger items like a speaker session or a coffee break. During NFT.NYC, Flow sponsored rideshares all over the city for conference attendees.

Giveaways/Swag

Whether or not you have a “booth space” or are officially part of the event you can come prepared to give away your own swag. I had tons of giveaways on hand during NFT.NYC and I used it to open the door with everyone I met while networking. I gave away a ton of stickers, buttons, and even beer koozies. I had a small backpack full of stuff and it helped cement my connection to the people I met after a long day of talks and nights of boozing in the city.

Ask Good Questions

I usually tune out during the question portions of a talk because most questions are super boring and self-serving. However, once in a while someone will actually ask a good question that helps to elevate the conversation between the panelists. I can’t help but take note of these people and I’m much more likely to engage them after the session to continue the conversation with them. Don’t use question time to shill your project but if it's related to the talk then it’s ok to mention what you do. 

Meetups & Communities

Outside of these big conferences there are meetups for crypto and defi in most major cities these days. In NYC we have the OG Crypto Mondays group and they’ve decentralized their event series to cities around the world. 

The odds are good you have one nearby, and if you don’t consider starting it up. 

The creator Lou Kerner was adamant when I met him that he wanted the organization to remain decentralized and he only was there to support people who wanted to create their own Crypto Mondays around the world. 

Outside of anything crypto related there are communities that exist and you’re likely part of a few. With more and more people onboarding into Crypto and NFTs you're going to find people interested in the space throughout your life. 

These are people you're already connected to so they're a natural fit to promote your project to.

Guerrilla Marketing Campaigns

I love guerrilla marketing, especially sticker bombing. I’ve been slapping up stickers for my comic book project @goofyfroot around cities for years. 

Recently I’ve been seeing NFT projects also utilize stickers in the same way. 

Usually these stickers will have QR codes that link to their mint page or discord. I’ve seen stickers from one project that sold out their collection and then turned the project into a DAO.

I’ve seen them from other collections that appeared to be struggling to sell any NFTs at all. I won’t rely on sticker bombing as your other promotional tactic but it can definitely be a cool element to your overall brand. 

As I get closer to my next launch I plan to get more stickers printed up and will be relentlessly slapping them up around NYC.

Public Display Ads - Subway Times Sq

I think NFT.NYC (or the week prior) was the first time any NFT project ever bought space on a public display ad. 

Whether or not my dates are exact, I was in Times Square when NFTs took over the electronic billboards and NFT.NYC attendees looked upwards hoping for a glimpse of their project or even their specific NFT. 

This was a huge week for NFTs in general, maybe the largest to date as the vibes were incredible and it showed so many builders the power of our community. 

There were also trucks driving around Manhattan with NFTs displayed on the side and the NFT ads ran in Times Square all month. 

It was great seeing projects like Cool Cats and Dead Fellaz up on the big board. I also saw plenty of projects that were clearly NFTs but I have no idea what they were and have never seen since.

So the question remains… is this an effective way to promote your project?

I am not sure, as 99% of the foot traffic has no idea what they’re looking at, but for people in the know it definitely makes an impression. At least when the project promotes their billboard placements on Twitter.

It’s more of a flex for holders or people bullish on the project than a promotion tactic in its own right. (Especially without an event going on nearby the billboards.) 

However, it is really cool to see NFTs out in the real world and it looks like projects are still investing in public display ads in NYC. I saw a project promoting in the subway as recently as a month ago. 

This is definitely a tactic to watch as public awareness and interest in NFTs increases. I think in order for these types of ads to be truly effective a recognizable brand like Nike or Adidas needs to try them to help bridge the gap for the average consumer.

We have a long way to go here but I’d rather see NFTs in public than ads for plastic surgery or phone companies promising their network has the most 5G coverage.

Final Thoughts

Future Marketing Strategies

We’ve covered a ton of different marketing and promotion avenues here in this piece and I don’t think this article is by any means exhaustive when you consider all the different specific marketing tactics you can use within each channel. 

What I do find interesting is what marketing strategies will come about in the future as the NFT space and metaverse evolve into something new. I imagine in the future we’ll spend more time in virtual NFT worlds and new projects might start marketing their collections within those worlds before they launch. 

A bit like the subway display ads but all within an immersive metaverse environment. I don’t think we’re ready for that yet, but it’s probably a lot closer than we think.

The Role of Content Marketing and Branding in the NFT Space

If there’s one takeaway I want to leave you with in this piece it’s that content marketing and branding are becoming more important in the NFT space as time goes on. The space already feels wildly different than a year ago when I started paying attention. 

Startup brands have been built like BAYC and Akuzi and major brands have gotten involved in the space like Budweiser and Adidas. I expect this to continue… possibly forever. That means the price point on earning attention is climbing too. 

If you’re serious about launching a project you should invest in both of those areas and continue to do so as a community grows around your work. 

I am confident that NFTs are the future of media and entertainment and are going to continue to transform our culture over the next decade.