The DMO & DAOstack — Bridging the gap
When innovative technologies come along and change the way we do business, marketing inevitably follows suit. For any marketer to be successful, s/he must be able to adapt to the changing landscape. Especially true in the decentralized crypto/blockchain arena.
Decentralized organizations continue to pop up every day. With them is a growing need for equally decentralized marketing capabilities that allow marketers to adapt to the specific interests of the new “crypto-customer.”
The crypto-customer is a different breed than the traditional clients we’re accustomed to. Due to the very nature of decentralized organizations, a project’s ideal customer resides in many diverse ecosystems. You have developers, designers, users, holders, traders, and more.
That’s a diverse group to try and market to!
You can see where a traditional marketing lead would have trouble dialing in the strategy for their marketing. As a decentralized organization, you need to have decentralized marketing.
Most decentralized projects are comparable to any startup. For some time they will be competing with companies that have solidified footing in the market. This means to succeed; a decentralized project will need to work smarter, be more efficient with their budget, and execute marketing moves faster.
Regardless of your religious viewpoints, there is no better analogy for this than the Christian story of the battle of David and Goliath. When David went into the battle facing 1000 to 1 odds, he knew he couldn’t win going head to head with brute strength. He used his resources to study his target, find an opportunity to make the most impact, and then took his shot quickly and efficiently.
This is the approach decentralized organizations must take. Even the largest decentralized organizations (Bitcoin, Ethereum, etc.) have to outmaneuver and outsmart their entrenched centralized competitors.
But how?
The Decentralized Marketing Organization (DMO)
The Decentralized Marketing Organization, as explained by expert crypto-marketer
, “Aims to identify the marketing activities that are least costly and give smaller companies the best possible return” He states, “The returns in the case of a decentralized project are measured regarding the value of that project’s crypto-token.”He goes on to forewarn that the DMO does not replace all of the efforts of traditional marketing, only exposes the unnecessary amounts of capital spent on marketing tactics that are ineffective. It also gives insights into which markets are going to be most useful to market to and how, saving both time and money.
DMOs function in a way that can leverage the capabilities of decentralized technologies for more meaningful insights and more effective marketing. Technology such as smart contracts, asset programmability, and scalable governance are all native to the blockchain and can be used to help drive better results.
How it’s built — DAOstack
DAOstack classifies itself as an operating system for DAOs (Decentralized Autonomous Organizations). The DAOstack protocol allows for the creation of decentralized web companies on its platform. In their own words, “it’s the Wordpress for the DAO. It does for the blockchain what Wordpress has done for the web.”
It offers decentralized companies the ability to build (or source) customizable plug and play modules to use in creating the framework for their DAO. These modules can execute the organization’s functions such as configuring its governance structure, distributing tokens and reputation points, finding collaborators and offering rewards to users.
DAOstack offers an open framework that enhances an ecosystem of true collaboration across these distinct but interoperable DAOs. Over time, contributions from independent developers and new DAO companies built within DAOstack create a database of templates, governance modules, and DApps (decentralized applications) that the community as a whole can benefit from.
This is the power of the network effect. As more and more users build on DAOstacks platform, the capabilities and use cases of DAOs increase exponentially. Organizations can pull modules from the DAOstack library that accurately fit the needs for their projects, enabling DAOs to work with less friction, lower costs, and greater agility (to be David).
How it works
The implication of these technologies is evident, but how do they come together?
I like to think of a DMO as a walking, talking, marketing machine.
The DMO is the outer shell that holds all of the marketing functions within.
The DAOstack modules are the gears that make the DMO run. It provides the functions that allow the marketing machine to work.
One of the modules, for example, is the decentralized Artificial Intelligence (AI) function. Built on DAOstack and integrated into the DMO. It plays an integral part in the DMO functioning correctly. Without the AI capabilities, no marketer would have any way of seeing or understanding what is going on. The AI reads the data provided through the DAOstack modules, interprets said data into meaningful insights, and then presents it in a way the marketer can understand and use to take advantage of the market.
Think about the marketing machine (DMO) having a motherboard of sorts, with cassette slots for any function you would like the DMO to perform. The team can either build or source modules that perform their desired functions then plug them into the DMO motherboard.
Another module that could benefit marketers is the ability to incentivize a collective community to take action towards a common goal. Let’s explore what a content management function might look like within a DMO.
The Content Manager Module
Token holders are naturally invested and intensely motivated to do what they can to help increase the value of their token. This is what initially brought us the term “shilling.” Token holders willing to engage in activities they believe will drive the utility and value of the token.
For the most part, this type of free marketing is excellent for a project, but it also comes with its own set of drawbacks. Token holders who are not that well informed could spread inconsistent messaging about the product, or differing points of view from what the projects team thinks are the best use cases. In a decentralized marketing world, we can combat this.
Imagine that a particular crypto project doesn’t have the budget (or workforce) to have a dedicated content/social media manager on staff. They do however understand the importance of marketing on the success of their project, so they consult the help of the DMO.
As we explained previously, one of the advantages of decentralized marketing is the ability to incentivize a collective community to leverage set brand assets to support consistent messaging. The project decides this is a perfect way for them to utilize the DMO instead of hiring a full-time content/marketing manager.
The DMO allows the crypto project to source their “CM module” and build a portal on their platform where they can upload any content they want for sharing. Blogs, videos, graphics, stories, milestones, you name it. The projects token-holders–now turned crypto marketers–can go to that portal and earn cryptocurrency for sharing the provided content on the project.
This module allows each project lead to control the content and brand messaging that it believes are the best for the success of the project. It also provides an opportunity for their community to share a message because they want to, not because they’re asked. There is a big difference. A decentralized organization is now able to influence the communities marketing decisions by incentivizing them with token rewards, instead of flexing their authority.
Alchemy + Holographic-Consensus = what makes it all possible
I just described a module used within the DMO, but all of it is made possible by a piece of the “tech stack” native to DAOstack’s platform, Alchemy (further explained in CEO
’s article, Decentralized Governance Matters)Alchemy is a DApp built within DAOstack that allows a DAO to set exact budget amounts. In this case, said projects budget for the CM module.
That, paired with DAOstack’s holographic-consensus protocol–which helps funnel the communities collective attention toward what it deems “an interesting –is what makes the CM module possible in the DMO.
A project’s giving away tokens for sharing their content? I find that proposal very interesting indeed.
Conclusion
The CM module is just one of many more functions that are possible within a DMO. Prediction engines, bots, idea generation, bounty programs, etc. are all possibilities that marketers can expect to see soon. The implications are right there in front of us, you just have to be willing to be fluid in your methods, and keep up with an acceleration in technology innovation that we haven’t seen since the dawn of the internet.
Luckily for marketers, we will have the DMO to assist us, and DAOstack to make sure that it’s a possibility.
