The Story of Swace. Q&A With Swace CEO, Dovydas Riasnojus
Ahead of the end of our Initial Exchange Offering on July 26 (that’s this Friday!), we sat down to carry out this short Q&A with Shortex — one of the exchanges where it is taking place — to talk about the story behind Swace, what’s next for our project, and how we are seeking to re-define the future of consumer/brand engagement.
The first round of Swace IEO has been extremely successful, so we at Shortex decided to conduct a short interview with the founder of Swace, Dovydas Riasnojus, to meet the brains behind this exciting blockchain-based project, which is expected to close the engagement gap between brands and consumers.
Dovydas is an entrepreneur with 15 years of experience in international business development and management. As a blockchain-enthusiast, he decided to found a startup that can possibly revolutionize the current state of social marketing. Welcome to Swace!
Dovydas, you have an extensive background in business. Can you share it with our readers?
I have founded and developed several international businesses including, most recently, Transcount, a startup company developing SaaS freight managing software. Having worked in a variety of roles managing, creating, and running companies, I have gained an understanding of the business world that enables me to be strategic, make informed decisions, and take calculated risks. My experience of working in different countries, including being involved in supply chain route development in Afghanistan during its restoration, has given me a global mindset, as well as a set of values that guide me during my day-to-day life and work. Rebuilding Afghanistan was a vastly international effort, which involved many government authorities, military organizations, and hundreds of dedicated individuals, companies, and unique points of view. Today, I strive to form teams with the same global outlook. Most importantly, I always try to give something back.
Why did you decide to launch Swace right now?
Swace is a blockchain-based social gaming platform where users gain rewards for engaging with brands. With Swace, brands can provide their clients with a fun and gamified lifestyle. Ultimately, we hope this approach forms positive habits involving the use of a brand’s products.
The idea of Swace first emerged whilst chatting with friends in a bar in late 2015. At one point during the night, I realised that there was no singular way to post a selfie via across all my social media platforms. This suggested me an idea to create an app that could solve this problem.
Throughout the duration of the Swace project the minds of everyone involved ran wild and it has gone through a number of forms. Its creation also allowed all of us to take a break from developing the complicated transcount software we were then working on. This is how the original concept of Swace, then known as Selfiemus, was born. We met up with the owners of Selfie.com, and we planned to merge with them. However, social media then experienced a drop-off in the number of selfies published, so we changed tactics. In 2017, we presented Selfiemus to a wider audience at the WEB Summit in Lisbon, and we showcased our idea to attending mentors and advisors from all over the world. We received a lot of positive feedback in terms of the functionality of our concept, as well as equally helpful constructive criticism regarding our focus on selfies.
Without doubt, 2018 was a particularly difficult year for blockchain startups. For us, these challenges also presented us with a number of difficulties in terms of the creative process and building a new app from scratch. Thankfully, the market has recovered and I am so excited that this project that started in 2015 with some friends in a bar has continued to grow. I can only promise that we will continue moving forward. From a social media perspective, there is no doubt that it has become a strong tool in the hands of individuals and brands across the globe. However, social media alone does not bring in hordes of customers. The extremely emotional connection between a customer and a brand is the secret ingredient in advertising. Highly engaged customers buy more, promote more, and demonstrate more loyalty. Providing a high-quality customer experience is a very important component in your customer engagement strategy. This is necessary for all businesses. However, a platform able to provide such high-quality customer engagement to bridge the gap between consumers and brands simply did not exist. We launched Swace to serve that very purpose.
What exactly is Swace all about?
After the summit in Lisbon we decided to make some radical changes to our app. Gamified functions became the focus, whereas selfies would only serve as a way of use self authentication. After a few months of working with our creative team, Selfiemus transformed into Swace. According to Urban Dictionary, “Swace is the ultimate combination of swagger and grace. When a person has both of these characteristics, they have swace.” This new concept revolves around three main pillars: gamified brand-user engagement, real-value rewards build on blockchain, and an online and offline world where Swacing is encouraged.
But why is it cool for users?
Because they can complete REALLY FUN online and offline challenges, and be rewarded in real-value SWACE tokens that can be instantly spent on real products from internationally-recognized brands who are using the platform as part of their marketing efforts.
Did any major brands show interest in the product?
We have already started talking with a number of international brands operating in Swace’s country of registration — Lithuania. These include Revolut, Red Bull, Pepsi, and Bolt. All have found the idea of Swace both very exciting and very promising.
How will your team use the money they raise?
The funds raised during both IEO rounds will be used to prepare the product for its pilot launch in autumn 2019, run global and local advertising campaigns, as well as fund marketing efforts. Finances will also be used to bankroll global expansion efforts, which will involve the opening of offices in London and Seoul.
What have you developed so far?
In October, we will launch a public test version of the Swace app for iOS and Android with a view to launching a pilot version in November. We have also prepared a short teaser video of how these things will look, so please take a look at that here to get a previous of how it will appear on your smartphone!
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Do not forget that the Swace IEO is still running. But like we said, it will finish on Friday, July 26. This means that there is a VERY limited amount of time left to buy into the very limited number of SWACE tokens remaining with an added bonus. If you buy yours SWACE tokens via Shortex, you will earn a bonus of 10%. Purchase on the ProBit exchange using their PRO token, and your bonus will be boosted to an additional 15%. Other purchases made via ProBit using BTC/ETH/XRP/USDT are also legible for a bonus worth 10%.
