I will be upfront with my feedback and say that I do not support this proposal.
For starters, it doesn't take into account any of the work and massive hours invested by community members into this very project. A large amount of work has already been done to present Hive as a space to develop on. We have secured multiple AMAs, speaking opportunities, sponsorships, provided materials, and presented to and in conjunction with multiple platforms. To pretend that nothing has been done is frankly insulting to those of us who manage these functions.
We already had a marketing company involved with Hive once and despite all their efforts, the impact was minimal. The impact of how much time managing and guiding them took, however, was unprecedented. We learned through experience that no external company can come in and treat Hive as a regular client, allocating hours to Hive as per their budget. The company we ended up working with emerged at a loss because the learning curve to market Hive while correctly representing it is very high. Everything had to be written and rewritten many times over, numerous people were assigned to the project and replaced, and in general it was far more hands-on than any other client, to my understanding. That relationship was not prolonged for the benefit of Hive and everyone else.
It is a fact that any marketing efforts will require the use of established Hive social media accounts. For security reasons, those accounts will always stay in-house and will never be passed on to external teams for management purposes. This means that they require the cooperation of account managers. This proposal does not even hint at the fact that other individuals on Hive will have to dedicate their time and effort to make the proposal a success.
We also already have several proposals out towards this end. One is @valueplan which is allocated to Hive promotional and marketing initiatives as well as sponsorships. $160k is about what @valueplan spent this year so far and as many know it's been an incredible amount of high-impact work and global representation. Next year we'll boost it further (this was our first year with such an account).
We have the capability to put together a portal/website in-house and due to our decentralized nature we should use that. There are more than enough frontend and backend developer, UX experts and designers. For anyone who wants proof, simply take a look at our dapps. Most of those teams were sourced from Hive itself.
Lastly, there are gaps in Hive marketing and I will be the first to admit them. The main gap right now is social media ads. The gap isn't because we don't know how to create them and set them but is a direct result of Hive being decentralized and not a company; we do not have a corporate credit card. It is a very simple gap to rectify and we have been working towards that and simply waiting for the bear market to end to launch the ads.
It is my position that any developer-focused marketing should be done in-house without (with due respect to your agency) hiring any marketing firms. We have the budget for it via @valueplan and we already have much of the work completed. I believe any engagement by your firm should be done at a hourly rate in a consultation capacity, if such engagement is warranted, and only for select segments of the proposed plan.
This feedback is not to diminish the credibility of your agency nor to insult your work. It's the honest feedback of someone who provided significant contributions towards growing the marketing function on Hive over the last two years.
Its a pity you weren't at HiveFest to see the presentation. Just because it didn't work to use an external agency before does not mean it can't be done.
Thank you for your comment @guiltyparties. We appreciate that you took the time to write to us at length.
As @arcange has already provided answers and as we are on the same page, we will not repeat.
We are open to any collaboration and even actively count on it. After HiveFest, @arcange told us about your role in the community regarding promotion. Maybe we could arrange a meeting so that you can share your experience and concerns with us.
Let's speak after Arcange is feeling better. One of the issues I didn't mention before is the fact that major campaigns have to be timed with the market turns. Right now it would be a loss but if we launch something on the upswing then we can ride the wave up. A Discord or Telegram group can be set up to discuss as preferred.
Voting to counter the downvotes, the discussion is interesting and deserves to not be buried.
yeah marketing campaign was 100% waste. But what do we expect? It was run by someone that has no experience in marketing.
"Top agency" is a sales word. The strategy was also bad in the proposal.
A working marketing strategy will become itself the marketing tool.
Outreach and post about hive on other sites ( private ones like blogs) is the most efficient strategy into sharing videos from hive users that have some solutions for some problems.
That would be network neutral and beneficial for all.
But will also never happen, because that includes SEO and nobody here understands online marketing or seo.
The marketing campaign was 0% waste. Thats utter nonsense. We accumulated millions of impressions and hundreds of thousands of views...
The budget didnt allow for much more. 60k HBD is literally nothing. Thats 2 mentions by top crypto influencers.
Yeah, it was a waste but doesn't matter.
Thinking more money is more result is a huge Timmy mindset in marketing.
Special because huge news outlets also accept paid content.
I think the "top agency" was a waste. The result is bad and impressions are with nothing.
Articles stay, Influencer shoutouts not.
I think the plan from the start was very bad, special because it was not bonded on a result.
This will always end up in waste.
And before you cry, its not critics about you, I know you tried your best and fall for the typical marketing of an agency.
But my old comments exactly said this long time ago.
Edit: and i saw the points, 100% overpriced for the results.
I mean for that "low 60k" hive could hire a person for full time reach out, lmao.
Its was big waste.
That is exactly the case 100%. Ads cost money, articles cost money, coverage costs money, crypto advertising costs money, influencers cost money, PRs cost money, sponsorships cost money.
Hive isnt Dogecoin that it has Elon Musk whose 1 tweet is worth more than 10 marketing budgets.
The agency worked for 3 months I worked for the next 9. So the marketing campaign in most part wasnt the agency.
For 60k you could hire 1 marketing agent, pay his wages to literally achieve nothing as he has no budget whatsover to work with.
I did that work for free and spent it all on reach.
Just on that merit alone this campaign, with the budget available achieved significantly more than could have if anyone was hired for the full lenght and budget.
One of the reasons I moved away from the agency was that people doing work want to be paid.
Im the idiot not getting paid and having to listen to this type of stupid shit youre writing. Completely clueless of the fact that I made 1 dollar spent be worth 2.
Without a defined goal marketing is worthless. It is what it is.
And reaching out means letting people know about it. That's the most efficient ( and time-consuming) strategy in marketing.
You are only proof of what I say.
Talking to tech sites blogs, and interviews and letting the marketing be viral.
It is what it is 100% waste.
But you are IMO was also the wrong person from the experience to it ( that's no personal offense).
Marketing at the end needs to result in a lead.
Or in a strong brand marketing.
Nothing happens, nothing to build on = waste.
This was literally done months before any proposal was made. Defining the goal is the most basic thing without which you cant even start anything.
"Reaching out means letting people know about it." Are you serious with this?
There is a name for every way possible in "letting people know about it". Email marketing, advertising, influencer marketing, PRs, general articles, videos.
Thats "letting them know about it." 😂
Jesus Christ dude. "Letting marketing be viral."😂
Ok, you go try that. Make shit viral. While you are at it, just go cure cancer and make world peace.
Just do it.
Im done here.
"I'm the idiot not getting paid and having to listen to this type of stupid shit you're writing. Completely clueless of the fact that I made 1 dollar spent be worth 2."
I'm sure you would work alone without an agency. Hire 1 web dev for 500$ from Upwork or fiverr for onboarding and build yourself marketing texts,
The result would be better.
"to this type of stupid shit, you're writing"
LMAO, I make a living out of marketing for close to a decade now. So yeah I think my experience is deeper.
It was from day 1 a waste. Wasting time on something stupid doesn't make it good, lol.
Btw the football guy never talked again after it about hive? And was never active since then?
I mean the agency was bad for sure.