Author: Cube Labs
Source: Cube Labs
TL;DR
The growth of Web3 is becoming more professional and refined. Projects driven by data have a significantly higher proportion of quality users compared to ordinary projects.
Common joint activities in Web3 (Joint Campaign) are indeed useful for growth, but the effectiveness of growth depends on how project parties accurately convert target users. Different operational strategies should be used for four different types of users.
For project parties that have passed the initial growth phase, simple growth is not the pain point; how to retain users effectively is the key.
Background
Recently, the growth strategies in Web3 have not changed much, but interestingly, there are more and more joint activities between project parties. It is obvious that single project growth is weak, and mutual user exchange among project parties has become the norm in Web3 growth.
But how effective are the commonly seen joint activities involving multiple project parties in terms of growth?
Do we really know who our target users are?
How to track data to mine real users and improve conversion?
How to accurately attract large holders or KOLs from other projects to one's own project?
To find the answer, last month I conducted a growth experiment for a joint activity involving 18 project parties, setting 20 user tracking data points, including but not limited to the following indicators:
Activity Indicators:
User joining time in Discord
Roles held and their quantity in Discord
Number of messages sent and number of people invited
Purchasing Power Indicators:
Balances of various tokens in wallets
Number of blue-chip NFTs held
Influence Indicators:
User Twitter follower count
Total views and impressions generated by user retweets, comments, and likes
Loyalty Indicators:
Average number of activities participated in
Number of POAPs and OATs held
It is somewhat regrettable that only 10 projects fully tracked the data indicators for the first 10 days. Due to the impact of data volume, the accuracy of conclusions may be biased, but a glimpse can reveal some insights. The current data still provides many valuable conclusions.
Joint Activity Data Review
This activity lasted for 10 days, with social media exposure of about 45k, approximately 21k users activated to the campaign page, **tracked users who completed all tasks, have wallets, and engaged in on-chain interactions and social media dynamics (i.e., real users) were about 2.3k, with an overall conversion rate of about 10%. It is regrettable that the data of 8 high-quality project parties were not fully tracked. The following is a detailed data analysis. 【Note: Related interests — All data in this article comes from Clique】
Real traffic distribution
During the activity, the daily user participation increased steadily, with more participants on the 2nd and 8th days. On one hand, this indicates that information dissemination takes time, and on the other hand, it shows that users are more likely to participate at the beginning and near the end of the activity. If the activity cycle is prolonged, user enthusiasm will decrease.
Distribution of New and Old Users
In this activity, 89% of users followed the project party's Twitter and joined the project party's Discord during the activity, counted as new users, indicating that the promotional demands of joint activity project parties can generally be met, and it also indirectly shows that single task-oriented activities are relatively difficult to reactivate old users.
Although the proportion of old users is not high, their quality is relatively good. The 11% of old users hold 26% of the overall user wallet ETH balance, and their follower count accounts for 31% of the total. Their purchasing power is more than twice that of new users, and their social media influence is about three times that of new users, indicating high overall value. If activation campaigns can be designed specifically for old users, the cost-effectiveness will be higher than for acquiring new users. Recently, the rapid growth of Crew3 also confirms the strong demand for activating Web3 projects, as the focus of growth gradually shifts from acquiring new users to improving retention.
Among the projects, 5 project parties with a large number of new users are mainly DeFi/NFTFi types, while the other 2 projects have higher reward values, indicating that new users prefer to participate in trading-type or high-reward tasks. Among old users, the highest activity levels are found in the DeFi projects Solv and ExtraFi, indicating that although various tracks and narratives are diverse, real users are still concentrated in the DeFi-related fields.
User Segmentation Profiles
Segment users based on purchasing power and influence, using the ETH balance and total value of stablecoins in users' wallets as indicators to measure purchasing power, and using the user Twitter follower count as an indicator to measure social influence (with a median purchasing power of 10 ETH and a median influence of 300 followers). At the same time, users' average participation in activities and the number of roles held in Discord are used to measure user loyalty and activity, resulting in the following four user profiles:
Valuable User【High Overall Value User】
More inclined towards DeFi projects, with high loyalty, basically only participating in the activities of one project, and relatively active, verified in Discord and holding roles, with an average POAP holding of 14, indicating that this group understands the gameplay of Web3 projects and enjoys participating in high-quality project activities. They are definitely the type that knows and loves to play.
Although the number of this group is small, accounting for 2% of the total, the average wallet balance is about 51 ETH, with an average of about 2.3k Twitter followers, holding 21% of the total ETH and owning 16% of the overall user follower count. They possess both purchasing power and influence, belonging to core users. If it is a large campaign, it is recommended to design more on-chain interaction tasks and allocate a larger share of rewards to this group.
User w. Purchasing Power【High Purchasing Power Users】:
No obvious project preference, both DeFi and NFT types are present, with higher loyalty, almost only participating in specific project activities. This group has a higher overlap with the addresses of major project holders and is likely to know the project parties, mainly consisting of existing users.
Low activity level, not very chatty in Discord, holding few roles, with an average POAP holding of 4, social media presence is not frequent, so the number of followers is not much, typical of the type that quietly makes a profit.
This 4% of high purchasing power users hold 60% of the total ETH, with an average wallet balance of about 48 ETH. There are quite a few large holders with nearly a thousand ETH. This group has strong purchasing power but is difficult to reach through ordinary information channels. It is recommended for project parties to form a large holder group or open a Whale Channel in DC, with important activities notified separately for a higher reach rate.
User w. Social Influence【High Influence Users】:
No project preference, average loyalty, will participate in activities of multiple projects simultaneously, with a relatively even distribution in each project party, very high activity level, holding at least 2 roles in the project party's Discord, with an average POAP holding of 16. Although the funds are not large, the influence is high, belonging to the type of Web3 micro-influencer.
This 6% of high influence users hold 57% of the total Twitter followers. For such users, more tasks can be designed for retweeting, tagging friends, and inviting. It is recommended to directly reward Tokens to fully leverage the low-cost acquisition and user multiplier effect of social media.
General Active User【Active Users】:
No project preference, relatively low loyalty, will participate in at least 3 or more activities simultaneously, very high activity level, holding 1-2 roles in the project party's Discord, basically holding POAP or OAT, should belong to the type that takes advantage of opportunities or seeks benefits.
86% of users are concentrated in this field, a large number, how to leverage the value of such users is a challenge for project parties. I firmly believe that every real user is valuable as long as they are not bots. By designing a good conversion plan, growth can be achieved. Therefore, for this group of users, it would be more reasonable to design more daily tasks and track long-term activity to distribute rewards.
As a project party, when designing relatively large activities, if rewards can be tiered based on users' multidimensional data, with different rewards accurately distributed to different types of users, it will help enhance retention, optimize ROI, and capture core users, rather than simply relying on raffles. There are too many opportunists and scientists in this industry. If the rewards ultimately end up in the hands of non-real users, it will be of no benefit to the project in the long run.
Project Data Analysis
Due to the determined publicity methods, timing, and cycles of all participants in joint activities, and the consistency of the task release platform, there are not too many external influencing factors, which is equivalent to a controlled variable experiment. However, the growth effects vary significantly. Among them, 7 projects had a new user ratio exceeding 90%, with an average of over 65% of users verified their identity and held roles in Discord, while some projects did not meet the expected results.
Is the difference in conversion data due to preferences in user tracks or differences in reward settings and operational methods? Perhaps the reasons can be found in the horizontal comparison of data from various project parties.
Based on the project's operational duration and follower count, project parties can be divided into two major categories: preliminary growth projects and stable growth projects.
Preliminary Growth Projects:
These projects have a small user base, and the main demand of the campaign is user growth. They are more willing to pay for traffic and do not pay too much attention to user quality, being in the initial growth phase.
Among them, although MadMen and MidaSwap have fewer social media followers, the quality of participating users is high, and the distribution of the four major user types is relatively reasonable. Interviews revealed that:
MadMen integrated its own platform channels into its promotion, encouraging users who watched the promotional video to directly enter the activity page, with rewards being redeemable vouchers for tokens. The early users of MadMen mainly came from quality GameFi project collaborations, and these users generally have certain assets and are willing to participate in activities and invest time, resulting in good comprehensive data.
MidaSwap launched promotions on other platforms during the activity, with cross-flow of users among platforms. However, as the internal testing phase has not yet begun large-scale promotion, it is mainly testing within NFT familiar circles, so there are relatively more NFT large holders and KOLs.
ExtraFi, as a project that has not yet launched, likely has a large user base due to the high relevance of rewards. Apart from SBT, all qualifying users can obtain OG roles in Discord, corresponding to future token reward expectations.
Therefore, for such projects, promotional channels and valuable rewards are the main factors affecting activity participation.
Stable Growth Projects:
These projects have a certain user base, with the main goal being real user growth and core user conversion, focusing on both quantity and quality, in the efficiency improvement phase.
Among them, SWAGGA and Solv Protocol have high user stickiness, and both parties stated that there has been no special promotion or rewards, currently, the participation level belongs to basic operations, and they often conduct activities to engage users. Large holders are already paying attention to project dynamics, and all are projects that have not yet issued tokens, so users may have optimistic expectations about the project's future.
Therefore, for such projects, long-term operations to improve user interaction rates are the main factors affecting activity participation.
After conducting 1-on-1 interviews, I found that whether it is an early-stage project or an established one, project parties that operate meticulously indeed have higher user quality and stickiness. In the current Web3 growth methods focusing on features, user experience, and rewards, the importance of professional operations is gradually becoming prominent.
New User Behavior Analysis
Increasing real users through joint activities is the core demand of project parties. The new users here are the target audience because they are willing to participate in similar activities and are easily convertible by other project parties. If we can mine and convert users with purchasing power or influence from the public domain traffic, it would be highly effective for growth.
Purchasing Power
The large holders among new users are mainly distributed in projects like Solv, MidaSwap, MadMen, and TraditioNow, with an average wallet balance of about 46 ETH. Among them, multiple new users in Solv hold over 150 ETH, and MidaSwap has holders with over 900 ETH. If you want to accurately reach large holders in joint activities, it is recommended to cooperate deeply with these types of projects and provide higher quality rewards. The users marked as User w. Purchasing Power with 60+ users in the chart below are relatively easy to convert target objects.
Influence
The KOLs among new users are mainly distributed across projects like Solv, SWAGGA, MidaSwap, MadMen, and ExtraFi, with an average follower count of about 1,000. There are 3 KOLs with follower counts exceeding 15k, and the highest has 32k, which is more than many project parties' followers.
According to the user profile data mentioned above, KOLs are easier to convert than large holders because they are more active and not as hard to reach as large holders. **If you want to convert the influence of these KOLs, it is recommended to increase tasks for social media retweets or invitations during joint activities.** The users marked as User w. Social Influence with 190+ users in the chart below are target objects.
How to optimize operations based on data and set data indicators
The first step in doing meticulous operations is to set data indicators. Without data, optimization cannot be discussed; otherwise, it will be very blind.
Web3 user data is particularly unique; asset, interaction, and some behavioral data are on-chain, but more information is still off-chain. To build user profiles, a combination of on-chain and off-chain information is needed, including but not limited to user identity information, transaction records, social data, asset data, and other multidimensional data.
In the above data analysis, many suggestions for the operational side have already been mentioned, and here is a brief summary:
Key Steps Optimization
Promotion Time
Based on the distribution of traffic over time, the suggestion for operations is that activities can start warming up 2 days in advance, with reminders 1-2 days before the end, and the activity cycle should be as short and quick as possible, ideally not exceeding 5 days for a single event. If it is a large event, it can be broken down into weekly designs and releases.
Tiered Rewards, Precise Activation
After identifying various types of users based on the profiles, different operational methods and tiered rewards need to be established. For OGs, leave enough reward shares, design more on-chain interaction tasks, and distribute rewards to this group; for users with purchasing power, form a large holder group or open a Whale Channel in DC, with important activities notified separately; for influential users, direct Token rewards can be offered during activities, with more tasks designed for retweeting, tagging friends, or creative/invitation tasks; for a large number of active users, more daily tasks should be designed, tracking long-term activity to distribute rewards.
Select participants for joint activities
Clarify the purpose of conducting joint activities, identify the target audience, and then filter and target BD to select cooperative project parties that meet the criteria, rather than accepting all requests blindly and participating in activities without a clear strategy, eventually discovering that the results are mediocre without understanding the reasons.