Analysis of 10 Tips for Web3 Entrepreneurship The period of bonanza for bottom-up project development has passed, and marketing is becoming more important.

Analysis 10 Tips for Web3 Entrepreneurship - Marketing is key.

Author: sleepy.mid

In recent times, I have been contemplating and making adjustments. The Web3 entrepreneurial environment has undergone significant changes since we started. After multiple iterations, our understanding may have completely changed. In this article, I will share 10 tips based on my entrepreneurial experience, hoping to provide assistance to those who are involved in entrepreneurship or interested in Web3 entrepreneurship.

TL;DR:

(1) If you want to make quick money, it’s better to be a hacker or trade cryptocurrencies instead of starting a business;

• Overview of the first six investment projects of the Base Ecosystem Fund
• One out of a hundred, taking stock of the first batch of investment projects by the Base Ecology Fund.
• Nima Capital sells tokens and sells luxury homes, previously invested in these 16 projects.

(2) The period of bottom-up project development has passed;

(3) Don’t just focus on hot trends, be forward-thinking;

(4) Industry genes determine that you cannot succeed in the “consumer” market within the industry;

(5) Don’t blindly trust any KOLs, project teams, or capital;

(6) Web3 Native should not be considered a sufficient necessary condition, in many cases, it is not even necessary;

(7) Marketing is more important;

(8) Choose to break away from the “Web3 self-indulgence circle” or follow the Web3 sentiment based on the industry format;

(9) Reduce ineffective social interactions;

(10) Take time every day/week to break free from the information cocoon;

(1) If you want to make quick money, it’s better to be a hacker or trade cryptocurrencies instead of starting a business

If your goal is to make quick money, then don’t start a business. From my perspective, this industry has too much notoriety; from your perspective, there are many ways to make money faster than starting a business.

Being a hacker or trading cryptocurrencies is the fastest way to make money, but the difficulty lies in the fact that you must learn. It goes without saying that you need to understand technology if you want to be a hacker. Trading cryptocurrencies has a low entry barrier and a high money-making threshold. If you can make money by casually operating without knowing anything, then it’s just your good luck. However, if you want to seriously use it as a means of financial investment, you need to learn some financial knowledge, secondary trading knowledge, and conduct in-depth analysis of some projects. Both value investment and sentiment investment require a basis.

Entrepreneurship is a much more complex matter. You need to consider compliance, team building, development planning, capital investment, and more. And you must know that the probability of entrepreneurial success is less than 1%, which is already an event with an extremely low probability.

Of course, if your goal is not to successfully complete a project, but to quickly Rug-Pull, I don’t think this article can persuade you. I can only say that everyone in the industry doesn’t have money now, so there’s no one left to exploit.

(2) The period of bottom-up project development has passed

At the beginning, there was a saying in the industry that Web3 projects should grow from the bottom-up, with the community first and then the community collectively deciding on future development.

Here I can clearly tell you, up to this day, if you are still using this saying, it is highly likely that the team itself has not thought clearly about the subsequent development plan.

In fact, I believe that the spread of such statements was due to the confusion between Web3 startups and DAOs, and there has long been a great controversy in the industry about whether Web3 startups should operate as companies or as DAOs. If they do not operate as companies, it will seriously affect efficiency, but if they do not adopt the DAO model, they will worry about not getting support from the community. In fact, I have always felt that many of the hotly discussed topics in the industry have already been concluded and verified in Web2, and this issue can be completely referred to the early days of Xiaomi.

(3) Don’t chase after hot trends, be forward-looking

This refers to the choice in the direction of entrepreneurship, not in the direction of marketing.

The speed of iteration in the Web3 hot trends far exceeds that of other industries. In a bull market, there may be a new story every day, while in a bear market, it may be more difficult as there are no stories to tell. Completely virtual industries are best suited for storytelling. Unless you have a highly efficient technical team and can discover the trend at the very beginning of each wave, it is impossible for you to catch the trend and launch a product. Moreover, you also need to consider that it may quickly become outdated, and the cost-effectiveness of your investment will be poor.

Therefore, you need to have your own understanding and insights into the industry and the macro environment. Don’t be a trend follower, but always stick to the direction you believe in and wait for the trends to come to you.

(4) Industry genes determine that you cannot succeed in the “consumer” market within the community

Let’s encourage each other on this point. If you want to enter the consumer market, don’t define yourself as a Web3 project, and don’t spend too much energy in this community.

In fact, this conclusion is strongly related to what we are doing, and it is precisely what we are doing that drives us to think in this direction and draw this conclusion.

Recently, we found that a project in the consumer market has stopped operating, so we sent our team to learn from it. The feedback we received was “low willingness to pay”. This actually refutes the stories told by many people in another circle.

Why is it difficult to enter the consumer market in this industry? When I was interning at a new consumer brand, I worked there for a while. Let me briefly share my experience. The description may not be completely accurate, but as long as you understand the point I want to make, it’s enough.

The general process of selling a product is as follows: users see it – become interested – click on the product details – place an order. At each step, the majority of users will not proceed to the next step. If the conversion rate from “seeing” to “placing an order” can reach 0.05%, it indicates that the product is very popular. From the perspective of quality, design, and price, this product is excellent.

Web3 users are also human beings and cannot escape this objective law, but the Web2 funnel has hundreds of millions of users, while the actual number of active users in Web3 is much smaller. So instead of saying that people in this community have “low willingness to pay”, I am more inclined to understand it as “too few active users”.

You may be wondering at this point: “Isn’t Web3 supposed to make it easier for users to become loyal fans?” Let’s see how this viewpoint came about.

Actually, the original idea behind this viewpoint was that you can quickly gather a community through the sale of NFTs. In an ideal situation, community members would actively contribute to the community, promote it, and engage with it in order to increase the price of the NFTs. Some people then believe that this is what “loyal fans” are. However, this is actually a misappropriation of Web2 terminology in the context of Web3.

“Consumption” is about selling products that fans like and need. The underlying logic is based on “liking” and “needing”. However, once Web3 incorporates financial products, it becomes easy for startup teams to make incorrect judgments. You may think that someone truly likes your product, but they may just be looking for someone to take over their position. If you cannot understand the true attitude of your users, it will become a fatal problem.

Therefore, in the context of Web3, it is better to focus on the financial attributes of the products. After achieving profitability, you can give back to your community through legal “dividends” or token buybacks.

So, at this point, I think we have reached a consensus, which is to make money from Web2 after capitalizing on Web3. After that, it becomes very clear that you should focus on the market where the money comes from and make localized changes accordingly. Just like you can’t use a strategy for the Japanese market to target the European and American market. If you want to make money from Web2, then participating in Crypto Twitter SLianGuaice every day and attending Web3 offline summits will not be of much significance.

(5) Don’t blindly trust any KOL, project team, or capital

I myself am a project team member, a small KOL, and have also worked in the capital industry, so this is a sincere suggestion based on my personal experience.

There are too many cases where people call others to take over their positions for their own benefit, which will not be discussed further in this article.

And you should not blindly trust the opinions of some relatively “positive” KOLs, project teams, or capital. As an entrepreneur, you need to have your own clear judgment of the current market situation and the future. You can consider their opinions as supplements, but you must internalize these contents into your own opinions and constantly improve your own understanding. You are starting a business for yourself, not working for KOLs, project teams, or capital.

(6) Don’t treat being Web3 Native as a sufficient and necessary condition, as it often is not

I wrote in a previous article: “Are we Web3 people overestimating the importance of Web3?”

Is being Web3 Native still important now? From the perspective of entrepreneurship and work, I believe it is completely unimportant.

In the past, we emphasized that being Web3 Native (Crypto Native) was more like putting a label on ourselves, showcasing that we are different and that we have been involved in this industry for a long time. The main purpose was to show our distinctiveness.

This barrier that we artificially set up often blocks people who want to enter the circle, and gradually disconnects insiders from the world.

In the past, I have seen many teams claiming that their biggest advantage is being Web3 Native, but they cannot explain what advantages being native actually brings them; I have also seen many communities claiming to have hundreds of active users, while there are only a dozen customers in the crowded hotpot restaurant downstairs from my home; recently, when our team was recruiting, we interviewed dozens of people and clearly felt that candidates with a Web2 background had higher average abilities.

In the past, people in the circle looked down on those from “big corporations”, but those who can withstand the polishing of Web2 probably have their own work methodology. Which is more important, mature methodology or familiarity with Web3? I hope to have both, but if I can only choose one, I will definitely choose the former. To be honest, I don’t think there is anything in Web3 today that can only be learned by being native.

(7) Marketing is more important

Previously, I saw someone comparing this industry to the entertainment circle, and I think it’s accurate.

In fact, marketing is very important in any industry, but due to the unique nature of our industry, marketing has become more difficult. 24-hour uninterrupted trading markets, constantly changing hot topics, cross-cultural memes… Startups need to put more effort into marketing to continuously attract attention, and do not equate data analysis with marketing.

(8) Choose to break out of the “Web3 self-indulgence circle” or follow the Web3 sentiment based on the business model

Web3 often self-indulges, and I think this is an indisputable fact.

So how should we make this choice? Actually, it still depends on where you want to make money. This does not mean that choosing A is disrespectful to B, after all, doing business is not charity. You always have to choose a more suitable track to start with. The unique charm of Web3 lies in the frequent outbreak of sentiment that contradicts the macro environment. This actually means the same thing as “self-indulgence”. Entrepreneurs need to choose based on what business their company is actually doing, whether to break out of the self-indulgence circle or make money by following market sentiment.

Both paths will face significant challenges. The former means that you will enter a more competitive environment, and you need to choose suitable weapons from the arsenal of Web3 to achieve differentiation. The latter means that you need to repeatedly discover and accurately predict market sentiment, guiding sentiment rather than being led by it.

(9) Reduce ineffective socializing

This is what I have been doing recently. As an entrepreneur, the problems that need to be solved in work every day are both heavy and trivial. Unlike employees who can focus on a specific detail, or freelancers (KOLs, full-time cryptocurrency traders, etc.) who have large blocks of free time.

You need to ensure that the work progresses smoothly, the company operates normally, and your knowledge keeps improving, to ensure that you stay at the forefront of the industry. With various things piled up, you almost have no time for socializing. So, before the company grows bigger, remember that every move you make should be for a purpose. Although I advocate for a combination of work and leisure for sustainable development, since you are starting a business, you should be prepared to work like a workaholic.

(10) Take time every day/week to break out of the information cocoon

I used to always immerse myself in Web3 information, constantly checking Twitter, listening to SLianGuaice… afraid of missing out on any news.

But after a while, I didn’t feel any additional gains. Instead, I found myself trapped in the Web3 information cocoon, often only learning about various Web2 matters after a week, far behind my friends. I realized that this is actually a dangerous signal. As entrepreneurs, we should not lag behind in terms of memes, news, economic situations, trends, and business models. “Self-indulgence” is fine, but “lagging self-indulgence” is terrifying. I have had similar experiences. Sometimes, during team discussions, we would propose ideas that we thought were very clever, but after further research, we would discover that they had already been implemented by a company in the Web2 field, or many things we found interesting turned out to be of little interest to the general public from a data perspective.

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