“Ask Why” to Grow an NFT Community

As I sit here writing the first edition of “A Rising Floor”, I can’t help but wonder where we’ll go in the future together. I chose the topic “WHY?!” for the first week’s message out of a lot of topics I’m already excited to share with you in the future. I’ll share “why WHY?!” soon!

“A Rising Floor” is a free newsletter & mastermind created to bring NFT collection owners and founders together to grow, learn… and raise the floor! Join here!

• Why WHY!?
• Who’s on first?
• Do you wanna be right or wanna be rich?
• You can’t push a string!
• A Short pencil is better than a long memory!

WHY why?!

I’ll spare you my background… you can learn more about me and my work/life experience in the Discord Mastermind if you really want to know… I’ll pat myself on the back briefly however, and share that I feel not only will this weekly message and mastermind be incredibly helpful for your collection or game’s growth, but you’ll be surprised how simple it will be to implement some of the strategies.

Most topics/weeks I’ll share “what” will help you survive and succeed… when feasible, I’ll even tell you “how” to implement things, and bring in others to help as well. Some messages will be more broad, and based on general theories or tips, others will include specific steps or even checklists, so you can just go down the list.

We’ll have live Twitter spaces (X spaces?) as we move forward, introduce you to founders who are crushing it in spite of today’s market, and strive to make this your “home away from home” for marketing and program growth info, peer introductions, and become an important tool in your toolbox.

Oh by the way… I need to warn you… I use … (three dots/an ellipsis) a lot instead of periods. (the one dot at the end of a sentence) I’ve written a book and a half, and it just seems to be what happens when I start typing… so … on to the lesson:

Who's on First!

“WHY?!”
“Why what?”
“Why EVERYTHING!” (remember these 2 words)

To some of you, it may have just begun to sound like the old “who’s on first” bit. If you’re old enough, you know exactly what and who I’m talking about and it won’t need an explanation. If you have no clue, do a YouTube search for “who’s on first” and have a clean old-school laugh.

Anyway… those two words: “why everything” can become a great rule of thumb to use as a guide to help you anytime you’re making a decision on what to do next with your NFT community, your NFT marketing, your Discord, or even your next promotion, airdrop, or mint.

For everything you do, there has to be… A REASON! No, no, no… not a reason for YOU to do it, that’s easy and probably will be about as effective as flipping a coin… but a reason for THEM (your prospects/people) to pay attention to whatever it is you’re doing.

Why should they do ANYTHING you’re proposing? They need…A REASON!

For whatever it is you do that includes your community or the public, you need to put yourself in the shoes of your holder or community member, even the flippers. (they’re people too, lol!) People with limited time, money, and attention spans… and think “if I were them, WHY would I DO this!?”

Think: If you were the holder, how would you answer:

WHY would I buy this NFT or ordinal?
WHY would I buy multiples?
WHY would I join this WL?
WHY would I retweet this post?
WHY would I join this Discord?
WHY would I buy multiples?
“Why EVERYTHING!” (why anything?)

And also consider the opposite by replacing each question with “why would I NOT buy this NFT?”. This can give you as much insight as the reasons for. Consider doing what it’s said George Washington used to do… they say he would take a piece of paper and draw a line down the middle, then on one side list the “pros” and the other list the “cons”.

We’ll talk about creating a customer avatar (a profile of your average holder) in future newsletters, but it’s important to develop the habit so that whenever you’re considering doing something, you examine it from your people’s point of view.
It’s easy as a developer/founder to let your own opinions or personal tastes control your direction. If you’re blessed with experience, good judgment, and/or people skills then you have an edge. However, sometimes we all need to accept we don’t know it all and need to do things we don’t “personally like” for the success of the team. Fortunately, we can learn from others who have gone before us.

Do you want to be right or do you want to be rich?

Back when I was in my mid-twenties I owned a door-to-door sales company. I don’t remember all of the details or what we were arguing about, but one thing I DO remember is a conversation I had with one of my first mentors, Jack Edwards. (he was the VP of my main supplier) He got to his position by excelling in the same business as mine. It was similar to a franchise and he did much better when he was in my position than I was doing.

I said, “Dangit Jack, that doesn’t sound right!”.

His answer: “Do you want to be right or do you want to be rich?”

I reluctantly did it his way. It worked. I never forgot it.

So getting back to the topic, it’s critical to try to think like your customer, and always put yourself in their shoes the best you can when making decisions. You want to “why everything!”. (see, you’re getting it!)

When you consider a change, an event, a release, a mint, a contest, or any change that requires your people to buy in, find the REASON your community would have to (or not to) get on board.

Give them reasons to check Discord every day. Find reasons for them to tell their friends about you. Find reasons for them to jump through whatever hoops you need them to, to further your program. I’m sure some people are thinking “yeah, Deacon, but that’s easier said than done!”. And you’d be right.

You can’t push a string.

I know, I’m getting a bit carried away with one-liners but it’s how I’ve remembered a lot of theories and such over the years. In any case, it’s true.

You can’t push a string. Go ahead and try it if you like… try a shoelace, or if you’re reading this during dinner, maybe a noodle. Lay it out in a straight line, grab the end closest to you, and give it a shove. Told ya.

Now straighten it out again… go ahead, I’ll wait.

Grab the end furthest away from you and give it a little tug! See how it follows in a perfect line! Make a little circle too! It follows! Go ahead and write your name if you like, or draw a house. (see how much fun it is to play with your food?)

Ok, eat the noodle and toss away the string… fun and games aside, playtime is over because there’s actually a point. Like you can’t push a string, you can’t push someone to give you their time, money, or attention either.

You’ll learn marketing strategies here, how to use keywords to sell, how to write good headlines, how to get people to sell for you, and more… but marketing 101 says this:

A sale will only be made when your offer is perceived to provide the other party with something that is equal to, or worth more than what they’re giving in return. Whether it’s money, time, crypto, or a Tweet.

They have to see… A REASON… to participate that is greater than their cost. The potential gain must outweigh the potential loss.

So… just like you can PULL, or LEAD a string and make it follow you anywhere, you can LEAD your community, and your core group will follow you anywhere as well… if they have a REASON to. (see the pattern here?)

The trick, of course, is to find that reason. Is it potential future earnings? Is it fun? Is it the feeling of belonging to a community? Is it the excitement of potentially winning something? is it the recognition as a core member? (we’ll have a lesson on the benefits of “personal attention” someday as well) Is it a title, or a WL offer?
Is it fun and friendship? For many, this rings the bell!

Knowing your community is the best way to start learning these answers, but a clever trick to know what will motivate your community to go to battle with you… that really isn’t a trick… can be shared with another 3 letter word… “ASK!”

I know, simple right? However, so so SO often I see projects run contests with prizes that don’t interest people, offer WL’s that nobody cares for, price mints at goofy prices or release them at the worst times, and make other decisions that seemingly were decided by having a monkey pick answers out of a hat. All they had to do, was ask!

You can have a section in Discord where you ask community questions, create a DAO to help with decisions, have a group of “core” members and give them a title and private channel to ask things in (they love titles AND personal attention!) you can DM people and ask them privately… “hey bud, I respect your opinion, what do you think of xxxx?”. (this really gets people to dig ya!)

Heck, create a poll and have a contest for everyone who answers… just remember, if you really want to know what pushes your people’s hot button…. don’t guess… ASK THEM!

And then the final step… after you find out what they want, use that to find a “win-win” idea where they’re getting what they want and you’re getting what you want. After you do whatever it is, you record and save the results to use as data in the future.

A short pencil is better than a long memory!

Everything you do is a test. Sometimes you’ll find your original thoughts were correct and you knew the answer in advance. Sometimes what you’re doing isn’t that big of a deal, so you’ll not bother to go through all these steps. Sometimes you’ll give your community exactly what they ask, or even beg for… and they’ll still complain, lol! (there’s always one, yes?!)

But even so, especially with things that take a lot of time, effort, or money to pull off… record your findings to use in the future. The ugliest website sometimes outperforms the “pretty one”. The long sales letter sometimes outperforms the short one. The contest giving a $10 gift card sometimes does better than giving away a $50 NFT. (and most people will do almost anything for free food, lol!)

The strangest things happen in marketing and business, especially in this crazy funny-money blockchain niche! (many times with no seeming explanation) However, if you have a record of what you’ve done, WHY you did it, what your community asked for, and the results… you have data to pull from so you don’t repeat your mistakes.

So…

ONE: When you’re making a decision that involves your community, always remember to give them a REASON to join in. It doesn’t matter if it’s as simple as having them check your announcements daily, or minting a new collection.

TWO: To help find that reason, get creative, put yourself in their shoes, and ASK them what they think or for their input before doing it. Lead, and don’t push them. Give them equal or more than you ask for in return.

THREE: Record the results to use in the future when making similar decisions.

If you don’t feel like remembering all of that, just remember “WHY everything!”. Any time you ask your community to do ANYTHING, ask yourself “what is THEIR reason to do it?”.

Whew! I truly hope you got something out of this first message. I asked myself “what reason do they have to need to know this?” before I started writing. In addition, I want to ASK you:

What would you like to learn about in the future? How can I help you?

I’d also ask that if you enjoy this newsletter, please pass along the link to others on your team, as well as other project leads and founders. There’s so much to be said for a mastermind where you can chat with peers, create partnerships, and share tips and tricks… this will all happen in Discord.

Please move this email into your whitelist, and it would be REALLY helpful for our deliverability (emails not going to spam) if you would hit “reply” and shoot me a note. Ask a question, tell me a joke, or your favorite kind of pizza…

We’ll soon have a training about creating an email database of your members, (OMG this is SO important!) and then another about actually getting your emails delivered.

You should consider the above “lesson 1”. (and reply, yo!)

A floor is rising!

Deacon Nick

PS- Please feel free to invite your people, as well as other project leads and founders to help the group grow. The more of us there are, the better!

A Rising Floor is a weekly newsletter and Discord Mastermind created for NFT and ordinal collection owners, staff, and founders. It’s a free source of news, marketing help, and a place to communicate with peers for the advancement of the industry.

Register for the free newsletter at: https://arisingfloor.com

Join the Discord Mastermind at: https://discord.gg/hSkF2bvSUx

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