Preface: On September 21, the second Growth Hacker Camp co-organized by BeWater & PANews came to a successful conclusion in Singapore. In this event, mentors from top projects and VCs in the Web3 field discussed in depth core topics such as personal branding, growth strategy, community building, user retention and conversion, and brought valuable insights and inspiration to the audience.
This growth training camp has been well received. BeWater has compiled the content shared by the mentors into articles and set up a series of "Growth" topics for readers! The fifth article in this series is from ABCDE Capital partner BMAN (Crypto's top-level narrative). The following is a summary of BMAN's speech:
The Biggest Challenge for Web3 CMOs — Narrative Science
Many CMOs are always impulsive when deciding on project narratives, and are not clear about how to deploy them. In other words, they have not formed a systematic thinking framework. So today we will talk about narrative science and how to become a good narrative scientist.
Strategic layer: How to create the first or only exchange?
“The mind of a beginner is full of possibilities, while the mind of an expert is short of possibilities.” - Shunryu Suzuki
Many beginners think that the growth concept is full of possibilities, but the real growth concept is far more than just an idea, but a definite path. So from a strategic level, I would like to propose the following four considerations:
Step 1: First, we need to analyze the external environment and determine who our competitors are and what their value is. As Drucker mentioned in answering the first question of management: "Who are our customers and what is their value."
Step 2: We need to avoid competitors’ strong points in customers’ minds, or take advantage of the weaknesses hidden in their strengths, locate competitors’ relatively weak positions, and establish brand advantages.
Step 3: Then, we need to seek a reliable proof for this positioning, that is, a certificate of trust. You need to make others believe in your possibility. For example, why exchanges usually sign spokespersons is because the public will attach trust in the spokesperson to the project.
Step 4: Finally, we need to integrate this positioning into all aspects of the company's internal operations, especially to have enough resources in communication to implant this positioning in the minds of customers.
Successful Case - FTX: Taking the establishment of an exchange as an example, we first analyze the external environment. Now there are Binance and Huobi in the market... In such an environment, we need to find a breakthrough - what value do we give to customers? For beginners, there are many possible answers; but for mature founders, there is only one answer in their minds (the choice of FTX) - "Built by Traders for Traders". My customers are traders, and my value is to give my traders the best trading experience, which is also a vacancy in the early strategy. And this is exactly what my competitors can't do, so this is where I stand.
So how to find a reliable letter of trust next? FTX booked a commercial basketball court, and then started with a mid-term exchange, signing four or five projects to make everyone feel that this exchange is reliable. Finally, internal operations are needed to implement this positioning in all aspects. At the beginning, the corporate spirit conveyed by FTX was "altruism" and provided growth services to traders. The photo uploaded by FTX of the founder lying in an office chair to rest also cleverly interprets their concept of doing their best to serve customers.
Differentiation Layer: How to create a differentiated and awesome Layer 2?
"Defeat them where they are not." - Willy Keeler
After I have a strategy, how can I differentiate myself further if I want to be the most popular exchange for traders? I think there are mainly seven aspects:
1. Performance
Because of the functional limitations of past products, a certain task goal that you really want to complete cannot be completed
2. Customization
Some customers have highly heterogeneous demands (demands vary between individuals); or they prefer the concept of exclusivity, and the mass products of the past have forced them to tolerate them.
3. Reduce Risk
Before and after purchase, people face great risks due to the difficulty in controlling and judging product quality and insufficient information, and they want to avoid them. Your products or services can provide quality or service guarantees to eliminate risks.
IV. Status
They want to create a positive image or avoid a negative image by using a certain product or service.
5. Convenience
Help customers solve tedious steps.
6. Low price
For customers who are unable to complete tasks due to price pressure. (Not the absolute low price, but the relatively low price)
7. Novelty
Dissatisfied with the existing way of doing things, want to try something new, but lack suitable alternatives
Narrative Layers: The Four Levels of Narrative
"I skate to where the ball is going to be, not where it is" - Wayne Gretzky
Narratives mainly have the following four dimensions, which are progressive:
The first layer is the one that is easiest for founders or marketers to see. We call it product attributes, which are the attributes, functions, and selling points of the product. For example, Scroll directly shows that they use ZK to expand a set of functions.
Then we come to the second layer. As a producer, we need to think about a question: what benefits can the functions and attributes of the product bring to users? For example, Blast’s official website clearly states how much actual income of USDB and ETH can be obtained through their EVM chain.
After describing the benefits of the product, the third level of narrative comes next: what psychological value will this bring? This level can be expressed through narrative, such as the savings brought by low prices, so why do users care about saving money? The reason is the psychological value we are looking for. As Polygon shouted, "Bring Ethereum to everyone", it gave the public the psychological value that Ethereum belongs to everyone.
Finally, psychological value will extend to a certain value of the user, that is, something that the user thinks is more important in life, like zkSync takes Scaling Freedom as the underlying pursuit. Although it is not recommended for all projects to do this, it can convey the spirit and value pursuit of the project.
How to turn a narrative into a movement
The core of growth strategy is to build a close community, and common goals or enemies are usually the prerequisites for forming a movement culture and stimulating members' sense of participation, thereby promoting common action. To form a common goal, first find the irrationality in the current environment, use this as a starting point, and work with the team or community to determine the direction of efforts. Secondly, transform these irrationalities into new behavior patterns and build new narratives. For example, the DOGE community has formed a unique spoof culture by finding a common enemy BTC, achieving resonance and unity. The SHIB community has formed a unique positioning by jointly targeting the DOGE narrative. The success of Memecoin shows that narrative is crucial in growth. Narrative is not just storytelling, but a way to change market mentality and values.
Marketing is more of a war around mindset, and the core goal of narrative science is to make the project the "first" or "only" in the industry. This requires not only finding a differentiated positioning, but also raising this difference to a higher level of values and culture.
Case: MegaETH focuses on the high-performance blockchain market. In the field of blockchain infrastructure, although everyone pays attention to performance and low fees, no one can achieve the ultimate. MegaETH chose to push performance to the limit at all costs. Even if it gave up the number of nodes and other aspects, it still achieved 100,000 TPS, thus standing out. Their slogan is "the first real-time blockchain". By implanting the concept of "real-time" into people's minds, benchmarking Zhang Yiming's "delayed gratification", and spreading this culture with peripheral products, MegaETH has won a unique market position at the mental level.
