Elevate Ventures Team Spotlight: William Jiang, Head of Operations and Marketing
We take an inside focus on members of the team who contribute to our efforts in elevating the tech community
Every successful venture is powered by brilliant minds whose exceptional contributions ensure a “success culture” within the organization. We go up close and personal with the brilliant minds behind Elevate Ventures.
In this team spotlight, William Jiang, Head of Operations and Marketing, Elevate Ventures, shares the top three lessons he learned in the tech industry through his prior work as the Head of Marketing at the Metaverse Foundation under Eric Gu, CEO of the Metaverse Foundation.
“With a thorough understanding of the Chinese and Asian blockchain ecosystem, Elevate Ventures is able to strategically guide portfolios and clients through the process of entering this huge market.”
Tell us about yourself and your background.
I was born in Taipei and grew up in Irvine, a suburb of Los Angeles and did most of my schooling in the USA. I went on to study at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) and majored in Management Science, which is essentially quantitative economics, minored in Business, and graduated with Provost Honors from UCSD. Four years ago, I moved to Shanghai to be closer to my family. I’ve been in Shanghai since then and became deeply connected with the blockchain ecosystem in Asia.
What did you do in Shanghai?
When I first moved to Shanghai, I joined an asset management firm, essentially managing projects for them as the Head Project Manager at various locations within China, operating out of the headquarters in Shanghai for two years. After that, I joined the blockchain scene in China, first as Marketing Manager and eventually as the Head of Global Marketing at the Metaverse Foundation, which is one of China’s earliest public blockchains.
At that point, I was directly managing a team of seven, wherein we spearheaded both the Metaverse Foundation’s marketing efforts on both the China side and the international side, as well as one of the top twenty-five crypto exchanges called RightBTC. We worked closely with both internal and external stakeholders to drive effective marketing campaigns within China and internationally for both projects.
Why did you decide to join Elevate Ventures?
I have a passion for client service, and here at Elevate Ventures, we strive to provide the best portfolios and client service to deliver tangible results for our portfolios and clients. At Elevate Ventures, I can utilize my skill sets and continue to explore my passion for client service to the fullest, while at the same time providing positive value for our portfolios and clients.
What is your role at Elevate Ventures?
“In essence, we bring clarity to the goals of our clients and support them as they grow, which is the most fascinating aspect of what we do at Elevate Ventures.”
As the Head of Operations and Marketing, I work very closely with the analyst team to build use cases, foster partnerships and drive growth for our portfolios and clients. I also manage the relationships between clients and our business partners, portfolios, and the media. As a team, we manage the China and international social media channels for not only Elevate Ventures but for our clients. We work with many technology startups and blockchain companies to scale with them, as they accomplish their objectives in terms of business development and partnership development.
In terms of the use cases, one question that is often asked is this: Why are they important? Many companies have solid technology that can be applied to multiple targeted vectors and fields. Sometimes, there is not enough specialization, prioritization, or localization in this complicated technology. So we come in to guide our clients on this whole process of clarification, as well as write some of these use cases for them. Once we have established a strong use case, we help our clients approach their targeted partners.
For example, if an exchange or project needs KYC, monitoring compliance, or custodial solutions, we are able to prioritize the most impactful partnerships and connect our clients with the most relevant players in this field. These partnerships are able to drive substantial growth for our clients, in both investor network resources and organic company scale.
In essence, we bring clarity to the goals of our clients and support them as they grow, which is the most fascinating aspect of what we do at Elevate Ventures.
We venture-build with our portfolios and clients and help these early to mid-stage growth companies go from zero to one — which we refer to as our “10x playbook” built on expert strategies. We work on a lot of use cases, coordinate with many mainstream media publications and help companies build business relationships with strategic partners who have strong investor networks.
In your experience, having worked in China, and already being in the blockchain industry for quite some time, what are the common questions about the Chinese industry that companies ask you and how does Elevate Ventures provide solutions to them?
We get so many questions especially from international companies looking to expand into China. One common question, I would say is, “How to even get in?” It’s sort of that initial roadblock of trying to understand a completely different country culture-wise and of course, language-wise. Also, where do you start in terms of engagement on either social media or on traditional mainstream media? We even get many requests about how to plan events, roadshows, etc., especially within China, and also finding developers because China is such a large country with many smart engineers and developers from great schools trying to get into technology and blockchain.
I believe that is what Elevate Ventures specializes in. We currently have offices and presence in tier 1 cities such as Shenzhen, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Bangkok, and Los Angeles. We take pride in our ability to help our clients on the Chinese social media and connect the right partners and clients from the China blockchain ecosystem. Also, our ability to pinpoint the strategic target partners within China and the greater Asia region is our core strength and value proposition.
What are the three key things you can say you have learned so far from your vast work experience?
I would say the first key thing is learning about the differences and nuances between the China blockchain ecosystem and the international market. For example, on the international side, when I went to San Francisco in 2018, I noticed the place was a very developer, tech-heavy driven community, whereas the ecosystem in China has many exchanges that originated out of there such as Binance, Huobi, and OKEx — some of the top exchanges in the world. I feel there is a much more speculative nature within China.
The second is learning about the whole crypto and blockchain ecosystem. I’d like to think of around five to six subsets within the ecosystem. At least within the Chinese blockchain space, for example — one is the exchange, then the blockchain protocols, media, communities, wallets, as well as mining pools. All of these contribute to the overall ecosystem that is conducive to promoting blockchain.
Quite interestingly, since the end of last year, when the Chinese government openly endorsed blockchain technology, we’ve seen a flurry of hot activity flood into this space. So it’s very interesting to be in the epicenter of this, especially in Shanghai, which in itself is a fast-moving city. One would be on the frontlines to understand this new technology, so I am thankful to be there.
The third would be learning about not just the public blockchain protocol side, but also learning about the exchange side and running a digital asset exchange. We’ve had interesting work in good times and not so good times from 2017 to 2019. But at the same, having a group of people that you’re collaborating with and contributing together to the companies’ goals and missions on multiple fronts is exciting.
What excites you about working at Elevate Ventures?
It’s exciting to work with a variety of our portfolio projects as well as clients every single day to deliver results for them. Because, at the end of the day, when our client wins, we win. It’s a win-win situation that combines the best of both worlds. In essence, regarding what we’re doing at Elevate Ventures — crafting use cases, working with top publications, accelerating partnerships, and building the company’s branding to achieve 10x growth, all of these are incredibly exciting.
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