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Crypto Slang Marketing

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Several key tactics of marketing jargon include Stay True, Be Unexpected, Fabricate a Story, Controversial Topic, Praise Criticism Push Pull, Set Unrealistic Expectations, Smoke and Mirrors, Sharp Then Smooth, and Exploit the Poor.

Original Article Title: "Crypto Dark Marketing"

Original Article Author: Yudee (@yudeewxy), Founder of WXY crypto marketing labs

Marketing in the financial world is also divided into "above-water" and "underwater" realms. The classic tutorials and theories learned from the 4As belong to the above-water world, which encompasses standardized, compliant, and process-oriented marketing theories. While it is important to learn these, they may not always yield practical results. Just like most crypto projects follow a standard package approach for marketing: 50 KOLs, Telegram community partnerships, X Space, 10 PR articles, sponsorship of offline events, and more structured projects may also implement a points and airdrop incentive system... When this package is executed, the marketing effect can usually be linearly proportional to the investment, but achieving a viral exponential effect is challenging.

For the majority of grassroots projects, truly effective marketing often comes from the "underwater" realm. This involves standing in front of the masses and understanding how to effectively PUA (pick-up artist), how to appear "sincere" but actually engage in "brainwashing" marketing tactics. Without these "dark strategies," most projects would be selectively ignored by the market, as David Ogilvy put it, like "a ship in the dead of night, unheard and unseen." How to avoid being dealt the "nice guy" card by the market and instead achieve better results with limited budgets is the aim of "dark marketing." Based on my observations and experiences, I broadly categorize dark marketing into several sections, which will be continually expanded upon in subsequent posts:

1/ Stick to the Basics But Surprise

Brand content, official events, standard airdrops, typical partnerships, and endorsements from ordinary investors are all "normal" content that can be disseminated by the brand account. However, if a brand only has this type of content and lacks any engaging topics, it will not attract genuine attention. This content is like plain water—useful but no one drinks it. What the market wants is Coca-Cola, whiskey, cigars, or something with flavor. What has flavor? People are the most flavorful. Therefore, in addition to the official account, it is essential, mandatory, and necessary to launch a "personal account" on X. The content of this personal account should be managed as if it were a personal social circle, where all aspects of life, ups and downs, love and hate, and personal stories are shared.

Of course, the prerequisite for this emotional and authentic personal account is that it must have content with values, provide alpha information stemming from its status, have gossip, engage in real interactions with industry KOLs, and allow for some margin of error. A good reference ratio is 4:1, especially in a passionate community like the Crypto field on X, where for every promotional post, there should be 4 posts of value or interest. When promoting, it is important to be skillful. No one cares about what you are building; they care about "what it can do for them" and what value it brings to them. When Apple marketed the iPod, they didn't say "512MB of memory," but rather "carry 1000 songs in your pocket."

2/ Nothing to Something

There was originally nothing at all, but a fabricated story related to human nature, such as greed, desire, anger... attracting public attention, comments, criticisms, insults, praises... all aimed at generating extensive word-of-mouth publicity. When the story spreads with great fanfare, full of truth and falsehood, and constant plot twists, the official source will then make a whitewashing announcement. This manipulation technique is often borrowed by some politicians and Crypto celebrities.

3/ Controversial Topic

The market theme that a brand seeks to convey should be related to the brand or product's attributes. For example, a brand that emphasizes "grandeur" can play "Truth or Dare" with female KOLs; a product that emphasizes "trustworthiness" can collaborate with security brands and hackers... In this respect, there is much to learn from "Durex," as it can effectively and aptly latch onto almost all social hot topics.

4/ Praise, Criticism, Promotion, Suppression

99% of brands treat the market with the utmost respect, satisfying the demands of channels and KOLs without hesitation, and being extremely cautious about any slight complaints from users and retail investors. However, in reality, this approach may not entirely gain market recognition and respect. Similar to chasing after girls, being wholeheartedly kind to her may only result in being friend-zoned. On the other hand, a scoundrel may easily lead a girl to be confused and infatuated. What brands should do is not to purchase all channels, but to only promote top or key channels/KOLs. Channels that are ignored or expected to have poor results should be disregarded, with no benefits given to them. All benefits (such as high rewards/airdrops, etc.) should be exclusively given to top-related channels or top KOLs, even nurturing them to become the highest-level channel agents of the brand, just like the relationship between Douyin (TikTok) and Li Jiaqi. Elevate the KOL to a "big brother" within their circle, provide them with various resources, allow them to bring various benefits to their fans, and present themselves with both substance and face in front of their fans. Brands should form a "strong relationship" with KOLs, rather than the very common one-time payment binding. At this point, KOLs are no longer just cooperating once for a payment but can become a logic of small upfront payments and large revenue sharing afterwards.

These KOLs will then output brand content at high frequency and volume, attracting the attention of others in the market through their high-quality coverage and word-of-mouth. If other channels wish to obtain equal benefits, they must contribute to the brand, transforming the scene into channels/KOLs licking the brand and having to do so repeatedly. A one-time payment from the brand to the channel will have little to no effect. Therefore, limited resources/budgets should be invested in worthy top channels and KOLs. Therefore, brands must make a detailed division of channels and markets, as the "praise, criticism, promotion, suppression" of different groups is entirely different.

5/ Setting Extremely High Expectations

But does it actually materialize in the end? It doesn't matter, and no one really cares. For example, you might say that you are already in discussions with a certain sovereign entity regarding the planning of a local currency stablecoin. You might even just mention that you plan to initiate discussions. All of this is enough to raise market expectations because in Crypto marketing, what matters more is the hype, not the facts. The former brings in buys, while the latter leads to sells. As for whether it actually comes to fruition, I think the rare occurrence of landing in a Crypto project is more like a phoenix's tail.

6/ Grandstanding

It doesn't matter what you really have; what matters is the perception of you that you present to the outside world. Just like many losers and scumbags, they manage a beautiful social circle: the car is rented, the clothes are borrowed, the watch is counterfeit... But through the sieve of probability, as long as the pool is large enough, there will always be fish that take the bait. This is similar to some scam and counterfeit projects that go to great lengths to showcase themselves. Most of it is hypocritical, but retail investors may not necessarily be able to distinguish the real from the fake. If at this point a large number of Key Opinion Leaders (KOLs) are bought to promote, it is very likely that many retail investors will take the bait in the pond just like fish.

7/ Sharp First, Smooth Later

Starting out being a good person is not possible to quickly penetrate the market and win people's hearts. Even for those users, this brand is mediocre, without discussion heat. A brand that has just entered the market must show its personality, sharpness, freshness, creativity, and daring critical attitude from various perspectives. Without attitude, there is no heat. There are too many mediocre people and things; what the market needs is novelty, freshness, and excitement... especially for the masses, the more closely related to human nature, the more they can attract their overall unconscious attention. Therefore, when doing mass communication, it is necessary to balance sharpness and smoothness. Different channels need to focus differently. Brands of different natures should also have inclinations.

8/ Exploiting the Poor

The common view is that luxury goods ads should only appear where the rich frequent. This is not entirely correct. The places where ordinary people often appear are also secretly filled with many luxury goods advertisements. For example, Burberry, Chanel, and LV ads are often seen in the subway, and TikTok video streams often push Porsche and Ferrari videos to ordinary users... The conventional view is: to show the ordinary people, they can't afford it, wasting budget and ad space resources.

However, the marketing team for luxury goods doesn't entirely think like this. They believe that the poor also have their own value. "They can't afford to buy, but they see it every day", and this is the greatest value. Because only when 95% of ordinary people can't afford it, the rich who buy it can feel pleasure and superiority. This feeling is the core value that luxury goods give to buyers. Many borderline female streamers are also the same. They do not filter users when posting pictures and live streaming but the more people see them, the better. Although 99% of their fans have a freeloading mentality and cannot afford the entrance fee and tips. But these female streamers also freeloading off these poor fans. The more poor fans who like them, the more the top fan feels that sending gifts is worth it. The massive attention of ordinary people is the core social resource. Capital, the wealthy, enterprises, governments... are all vigorously competing for these resources. In a sense, this is "exploiting the poor".

At the same time, these luxury goods are also exploiting young people who lack conviction. Many of them will save a month's salary to buy $500 lipstick, $100 face masks, $30,000 handbags, $2,000-per-night hotels, and a few hundred-dollar Balenciaga black stockings... And they will also be very grateful for the opportunity these brands give them, thinking that they are one step closer to the wealthy class. Therefore, luxury goods or the high-priced products at the top of the industry have become tools for capital exploitation of ordinary people. So RM's hollow dial will attract the attention of passersby from a distance, although it is not as easy to identify the hour as Longines; the legs of young bodies wearing black stockings will be more valuable than the legs delivering takeout, even though they do not have more developed muscles... Capital is no longer just selling goods through high-priced products. Starbucks buys white-collar workers, Blueglass sells health, HW sells faithful love, black stockings sell a fringe... The tangible practical value that can be seen now represents low value. What people yearn for and what is most valuable are the intangible things.