MARKETING STEEM # 1 : Do we need a Steem PR service?
Steem needs marketing. No one disputes that.
It is the what, where, how and most importantly who that becomes more tricky.
Marketing can take many forms and have many flavours.
Advertising, social media, mailshots, influencer campaigns can be all be part of a good marketing mix.
One part of marketing that is often missed is Public Relations (PR).
Steem in the Media
When I started Steem News back in 2018 one of the sections was coverage of Steem in the press and media around the world.
Steem received quite regular mentions particularly in the crypto media in those days. This all helped build the profile, awareness and visibility of the platform.
Ever since then I have kept a tracking service running to spot any articles that include references to Steem or Steemit.
These days unfortunately such mentions are very, very rare indeed.
In December 2018 when Steem News started, Steem was in the top 50 on CoinMarketCap, so the crypto media often came looking for stories.
Since then Steem has slipped down the rankings to the low 300's so we need to work harder to get coverage.
That is where a pro-active Public Relations campaign comes in to play.
We need to take our stories about Steem to the crypto media.
A Steem PR Service
Over the six years I have been producing Steem News I have often wondered if I could take it further.
Could Steem News be a starting point to takes news about the Steem platform into the wider world by feeding stories to crypto news outlets.
With the current developments like @the-gorilla's revamping of Steemit.com and new apps like SteemPro it feels like the platform is at a point of rejuvenation where greater exposure and awareness would bring definite benefits.
A PR campaign for Steem could operate at three levels...
Globally - targeting the main crypto news outlets like CoinDesk and Cointelegraph.
This would be for stories about the platform as a whole - such as the eight anniversary of steemit.comNationally - targeting the media in individual countries where Steem has significant activity.
SteemFest in Korea would be an example of a story at this level.Local & Regional - targeting local and regional news and media outlets in countries where Steemians are involved in projects at a local level.
The project @ubongudofot is running to install solar PV systems in schools in Nigeria would be a suitable story for this level of PR work.
There would be some considerable initial work to be done in terms of building up lists of media contacts, and establishing a network of Steemians around the world to help with translating and local targeting.
Once up and running I think we should be looking to get at least one or two stories in the main crypto media each month, along with regular weekly coverage at national, regional and local levels.
This sort of PR work of course won't bring a million new people to the platform nor double the price of STEEM overnight, but it will help.
It will help rebuild the awareness, the visibility and the credibility of the platform and its community.
Steem has been going for 8 years - and it is still going strong.
There are not many in the crypto world that can match that.
What do people think?
Would running a PR service for Steem be useful?
Are there enough 'good news' stories on Steem to make this idea viable?
If the answer is YES I will draw up a plan.
Thank you
I think it's a good idea and definitely worth a try. Will it be effective? I don't know, I remember similar attempts at the beginning of Steemit's existence (because I registered here only two months after the official launch), which were then repeated several times. Was it useful in terms of attracting new users and investors? Hard to say. I remember how Steemit faced a very serious crisis after the first year of its existence, when its price dropped to seven cents, and there were only a few hundred active bloggers left on the platform, and I was among them. Then the hype began with the growth of the crypto market in 2017 and many people returned, because it was possible to make good money here on the wave of hype. Yes, many of them did not bring anything valuable to the ecosystem, and this again caused a crisis by buying votes (this was once a common practice here). This eventually led to a blockchain fork, as two different camps formed with different approaches to the development of the Steemit ecosystem, and that's okay. It's just great that the world of cryptocurrencies makes it possible to resolve conflicts in this way, instead of starting wars where tens of thousands of people die. I was sure that the people left in Steemit would not be able to save the day. But I was wrong and I admit that I was wrong. Here began to form its own unique ecosystem with a structured curation system, which began to filter out many low-quality and frankly garbage posts. And that's what I think attracts new and old users, because I'm back here after a few years of absence, and I regret that I wasted a lot of time building such a great site where people can freely express their opinions and get paid for it. Perhaps it is worth talking about this when promoting Steemit on other platforms.
TEAM 1
Congratulations! This comment has been upvoted through steemcurator04. We support quality posts , good comments anywhere and any tags.Yes pre-fork 'Old Steem' and post-fork 'New Steem' are really quite different with a different community and different ways of working. I am very happy that Steem survived the 'big split' as at the time it was very uncertain which way it would go.
That split is now part of Steem's unique story - surviving and I hope thriving.
It is a story we can tell the world through PR to attract new people to enjoy what we are building here.
Indeed, this story is worth telling, how to rise from one's knees after the darkest of times. I hope that here in Ukraine we too are at such a point in history that we will remember one day with tears in our eyes and sadness in our hearts, but with confidence in the bright present and beautiful future.
The answer is YES.
But the PR-solution is NOT linking each (shxxx) post on other platforms (X, Insta…) Luke a lot of communities and even the greeters demand…
You will make a great plan!
Totally agree on this...
I would keep the PR service targeting press and traditional media rather than social media. Social media needs a quite different approach.
I think steem did not need marketing, steem need appreciation and some upvotes to new commers, 1 is one , 2 is 11,more people to steem then lefting the steem is steem needed
Just an idea... If I may offer.
If everyone does their little part! While campaigns and mass dissemination are crucial, how about each user shares their best work directly with friends and family by linking the post through their preferred messengers (Discord/WhatsApp/Instagram, etc.)? This way, the author can gauge the quality of their work for example at least I would not share my sh**** post with an acquaintance of mine! and if they manage to attract even one more person or perhaps someone interested in investing, it's a win-win.
I would say the high-paying authors/curators can have the most profound effect. Just my two cents.
TEAM 1
Congratulations! This comment has been upvoted through steemcurator04. We support quality posts , good comments anywhere and any tags. TEAM 1
Congratulations! This comment has been upvoted through steemcurator04. We support quality posts , good comments anywhere and any tags.Muy necesario, ver a Steem con un equipo de Marketing! Como muchos otros Steemians he apoyado la promoción desde mi cuenta de YouTube, Instagram, Tiktok y hasta logré crear un canal de telegram con mas de 500 suscriptores
Pero mas allá de usuarios comunes, necesitamos hazañas para que entonces vean a Steemit como un proyecto formal y bastante confiable
He estado pensando en una técnica para redes sociales y es básicamente orientar a la comunidad de mi ciudad sobre Steem.
Proyectos de salud podrían ayudar a ver a Steem en las noticias del periódico regional. Algo por el estilo esta maquinando mi mente, sin embargo necesitaría algunos permisos y una institución dispuesta al servicio de las personas, además de algunos voluntarios de noble corazón
Estaré a la espera para leer el plan que tiene en la mente! Estoy segura de que ayudará a impulsar a Steem 🚀🚀🚀
TEAM 1
Congratulations! This comment has been upvoted through steemcurator04. We support quality posts , good comments anywhere and any tags.I believe that any work to inform people about Steem is very necessary. Even if all the plagiarists, fraudsters, bots disappeared from Steem and there were 100 extremely talented authors left, this closed elite club would not attract the attention of investors, and therefore, over time, these authors would receive rewards that would not be worth anything.
I'm trying to promote Steem on Instagram. At first it was quite a promising project. We had a team and everything looked clear. But it turned out that everything is not so simple. Many difficulties arose. In addition, the lack of additional profit, I think, did not allow to keep this team.
Now I continue the work on my own, but it is not very effective. First, you need quality professional video content. Ideally, you need an influencer who will talk about their experience on Steem. Such content can be obtained by paying for its production. Secondly, it is necessary to quickly spread the right information. This requires a ready-made network of bloggers or mass media.
I strongly believe that it would be good to order a promotion campaign for Steem from professionals. It may cost several thousand dollars, but it will be worth it.
As for your suggestion, I think it is excellent. It's worth a try. Even if it seems difficult at first, you never know how things will turn out.
Social media marketing and promotion is definitely important and useful but it does need a specific set of resources.
Thank you for your support for a PR campaign.
Hey!
You are totally right, we should be doing a lot of marketing work. Another thing that there is missing is innovation. Steem can be more than a blog, Steem could include games, new coins, and much more.
I think PR work that you are talking about is good, share with me when you start it!
Steem should be top 10 crypto, it is not impossible but we have to work
We definitely need more innovation.
One of the target audiences for any sort of marketing should be developers and innovators.
If more developers find the platform, then more innovations will flow.
Thanks for your support of the PR idea.
Steem was once number 3 in the crypto rankings. It was #25 when I joined platform.
Getting back in to the top 100 should very much be our first target.
Yes thats true, divide the problem in several little problems and the thing will be easier.
Yes. I strongly agree with the importance and necessity of steem pr. Although it may be weak now, I believe there will be good results if we continue to do it. I appreciate your sincere and good writing. :)
Thank you for your support. I hope we can set up a full PR service to help grow Steem.
PR will be useful but please wait. Before starting a PR, we need a modern, clear and functionable frontend, called Condenser. This takes time.
But preparing PR seasons is not the wrongest move. I feel a little bit of bullish vibes.
I think I do. If people show up here and have a bad experience then whatever brought them here did more harm than good. Right now my expectation is that the typical new person will have a negative experience with the chain, so I think addressing the problems in the ecosystem should be a higher priority than marketing.
Unfortunately that risk of the initial bad experience has been the case on Steem for as long as I can remember.
Improving the onboarding and initial experience can definitely be improved but if we have to wait for it to be perfect we may never get to do any marketing of Steem.
I think we have to work with what we have, rather than what we would like to have.
Personally I think this isn't a "not perfect" situation, it's an "actually bad" situation. And I'm not focused especially on the onboarding and initial experience but thinking about the overall experience, I think most people trying to use the chain in the current environment will conclude that the value proposition isn't there. If a restaurant couldn't get food out of the kitchen you'd tell them that it would be counterproductive to try to bring more people to sit at the tables.
What would you say are the most important changes needed at the moment to make Steem more attractive to users and investors?
Reduce the influence of bot voting, move toward trying to realize the original value proposition of the chain (rewarding good content) and away from being a de facto high-APR DeFi chain where the returns have no relationship to any real value. Work against spam and other exploitative uses of the chain. In the long run, all cryptos are probably a dead end if they stay disconnected from actual goods and services and are primarily just for financial speculation, so getting more goods and services that can be traded for Steem/SBDs would be good, but that's really hard to do.
All very good aims. The only problem is how do we achieve them ?!
Managing the transition from where we are to where we might want to be would be very challenging.
The biggest challenge would be maintaining the value of STEEM.
I'm not sure. Part of the problem is that some of the biggest stakeholders have a vested interest in continuing the bot-voting status quo since that's their business model. Unless and until some big players agree that it's a problem it's hard to see how the ecosystem as a whole can change course.
From a different direction, maybe one idea would be to have another active SPS/DAO proposal that pays out to some trustworthy person who then uses those funds to bankroll not-yet-established developers to do some smaller, contained projects to help build developer capacity. That's using the coin to pay for services (software development) and potentially seeds some content (progress reports, developers talking shop with each other on-chain, etc.). IMO right now what limited development is happening is too duplicative (how many frontends do we need?) and big-project-focused (so there are fewer discrete "new things" for people to talk about or be excited about).
Big Yesss !!!!
Thank you.