2018 Q3 Kin Highlights
Q3 was our busiest quarter so far. The last three months included Kin integrations from Kik and Perfect 365, the launch of Kinit beta in both Android and iOS, the launch of the initial Kin Developer Program, and a few new personnel announcements.
Let’s jump in.
Product and engineering
We launched a beta version of Kinit in Android and iOS in U.S. and Israel, where consumers can earn and spend Kin natively. The stats have been encouraging:
- 17,700 verified users
- 43% stickiness (the average Kinit user is using it 13 out of 30 days per month)
- 90% of users completed a task on their first day in the app
- 25% of users completed a purchase, averaging two purchases per user
So far, brand partners have included Blackhawk, Dunkin Donuts, SoYummy, Swelly, and true[x], and backup and restore was recently added as a function.
In addition, our partnerships and product studio has been busy meeting with potential and existing partners in New York, San Francisco, and Toronto on the Kin product offering, support, and technology. This included workshops with Perfect 365, which led to the release of the Kin Marketplace and native spend experiences to users in 27 countries on Android, which you can read more about in the ecosystem section.
Developer
In July, we launched the Kin Developer Program, a multi-million dollar program that incentivizes developers to build Kin-powered experiences into new and existing apps. We ended up accepting 40 apps into the program that span nine categories, including communication and social, gaming, and travel.
Developers are currently working on building out their earn and spend experiences, and will present their final products to the Kin team on October 15. Participants who can present a complete, functioning product will be able to submit their apps to the App Store and Google Play and will receive a reward in fiat and cryptocurrency once they officially go live (milestone 1). Additional program milestones to keep an eye out for are:
- Milestone 2: 10,000 monthly active wallets for at least two months within 12 months of demo day
- Milestone 3: 50,000 monthly active wallets for at least two months within 12 months of demo day
Additionally, we introduced kin.js, our JavaScript SDK.
Ecosystem
Q3 was an important quarter with our first partners going live within the Kin Ecosystem, contributing real earn and spend use cases for cryptocurrency inside of consumer apps. Kik added a new chat themes feature where users could earn and spend Kin on premium chat themes. Kik product lead Laura Newton also committed to Kin being a pillar in the company’s overall product strategy.
We also went live with the Kin Ecosystem’s first design partner app, Perfect365, the world’s largest AR beauty community. We’ve been fortunate to find another partner willing to dedicate resources to prioritize making Kin work within their app experience, and they did so quickly. The teams flew from China and Tel Aviv to meet for two days in San Francisco for a product workshop, which led to Kin going live five weeks later and more use cases are planned to launch throughout Q4.
These partnerships set us up for a strong end-of-year push and more ecosystem growth.
Community
The community has shown continual growth throughout this quarter as well as more frequent engagement from new and veteran members daily. We are always happy to see new names on our Reddit and Telegram channels, whether they are asking questions or actively taking part in the deeper conversations being had around the project and the crypto space in general. One thing that continues to impress us is the percentage of active members — more than 10%, which is huge in community engagement standards. Day after day, these members take part in making this community grow.
In June, the community management team officially joined the communications team, and as a result, we’ve been able to better coordinate our engagement efforts. We will also be surveying the community soon to learn more about your interests, outside of when moon, and to learn what efforts you’d like to see more of.
We also held three AMAs in addition to Ted’s monthly vAMAs, diving deeper into Kinit, our blockchain strategy, and new CMO Matt DiPietro’s role at Kin.
In addition, we concluded the pilot of the Kin Ambassador Program that called on community advocates to help spread interest in and adoption of Kin. Everyone knows these members by heart, and we couldn’t have been more appreciative to our intelligent and adamant supporters that hold our community and this project to such a high standard. We are excited to share a debrief of the initial program, as well as the program’s next possible rollout soon.
Growing the team
There are several open position in both our New York and Tel Aviv offices:
- Content manager (New York)
- Data analyst (Tel Aviv)
- DevOps engineer (Tel Aviv)
- iOS developer (Tel Aviv)
- Senior devops (Tel Aviv)
- Server developer (Tel Aviv)
- Social media manager (New York)
- Technical product manager (Tel Aviv)
- Technical writer (Tel Aviv)
If you’re interested or know someone who’s a fit, please email careers@kinecosystem.org.
Marketing and communications
In Q3, we welcomed our new CMO Matt DiPietro, former SVP of marketing at Amazon-owned Twitch, to the team. Matt is leading Kin’s marketing efforts and branding strategy for Kin and its associated products and services. In addition, the Kin Foundation welcomed former Ethereum Foundation special advisor William Mougayar as the second Kin Foundation board of director.
With the roll out of the Kin Developer Program, Kinit launching on both iOS and Android, and personnel announcements, we had a busy third quarter. Kin also celebrated its first anniversary in September, and Ted reflected on the year behind us and on what lies ahead.
Ted and Tanner spoke at Elevate in Toronto. Ted represented Kik and Kin on Elevate’s mainstage, and then spoke about the journey into crypto with Terry Pender at Elevate Blockchain. Tanner sat on a panel about tokenized securities and ICOs.
In August, we combined the Kin Blog and Inside Kin to make it easier to find all the latest updates on Kin. Our content now lives on a single property, Kin Blog. Here are the most-read posts from Q3:
- Kin Developer Program launches today
- Kinit Beta App now live in Google Play
- Doubling down on the Kin Blockchain
- Kin Developer Program accepts 40 developers to grow Kin Ecosystem
- Kinit app now live in iOS App Store
In the news:
- Red Bull and Swarovski are testing cryptocurrency tokens in exchange for engagement, AdWeek
- Today in board additions: William Mougayar joins Kin Foundation’s board of directors, Joule appoints Deepak Kaura as board chair, BetaKit
- Crypto startup reels in Twitch executive to spearhead adoption strategies, Bitcoin Magazine
- $3 million fund to create 25 marketplaces for Kik Messenger’s token, CoinDesk
- Kin has surpassed the daily active users of all Ethereum dapps combined, Sludgefeed
- Kik launches beta product after $100 million ICO, TechCrunch
- Kik is giving $3M to developers to build for its Kin cryptocurrency, TheNextWeb
- Kin nabs 40 consumer apps for crypto developer program, VentureBeat
- Kinit app lets iOS users earn and spend Kin cryptocurrency in apps, VentureBeat
- Perfect365 AR beauty app adopts Kin to bring more women in cryptocurrency, VentureBeat
What’s next?
Q4 is traditionally the busiest quarter as we close out the year (holiday decorations are already going up all over New York, so it’s already that time!). As always, tune into Reddit, Telegram, and Twitter accounts, and of course, Medium, for the latest updates.
