Inside Web3 | +100 Partnerships later
Discover more from Inside Web3 │ By Julian Ivaldy
Inside Web3 | +100 Partnerships later
Logbook of a Web3 builder: News, resources, fundraising, and learnings
Hey guys,
I hope you are well today :)
In this edition, we are going to talk about partnerships. Creating collaborations is a very important thing in Web3. It's one of the most recurring topics when I talk to other Web3 entrepreneurs. However, building partnerships is a chaotic and hard-to-scale strategy, so you must do it right and at the right time.
With Mobula, one of the first strategies we implemented to make ourselves known was to contact and conclude as many partnerships as possible. We were able to put in place strategies to scale the search for partners. However, with hindsight, I think it was too early to start creating partnerships and that we would have benefited more from waiting until the product was more mature. In this edition's focus, I will share my learnings on when to start looking for partnerships and how to do it best.
Inside Web3 | +100 Partnerships later
🗞 Web3 News
💼 Web3 Entrepreneurial Resources
🏦 Web3 Fundraising
📓 The Week's Log: +100 Partnerships later
🗞 Web3 News
🛣️ Nike Launches .SWOOSH, a New Digital Community and Experience
The platform will offer Polygon-based NFT wearables for avatars that can be used in Web3 games. It will provide users IRL benefits, like physical apparel or chats with pro athletes.
🗑️ Edward Snowden: Sanctioning of Ethereum Mixer Tornado Cash Was 'Deeply Illiberal and Profoundly Authoritarian'
Three months after the U.S. government blacklisted the Ethereum mixing tool Tornado Cash, Edward Snowden called it a "do or die moment" that people in the crypto community "largely aren't taking seriously enough.”
🏦 U.S. Banks Launch a Digital Dollar Blockchain Pilot
While the crypto market is shaken to its core by the failure of FTX, traditional financial institutions are taking a step into the world of digital currency. Mainstream financial institutions are working with the Federal Reserve to test a digital currency platform.
⚽️ Cristiano Ronaldo Launches First NFT Collection with Binance
Cristiano Ronaldo’s first NFT collection was launched Friday, November 18, as part of an exclusive, multi-year partnership with Binance, the world’s leading blockchain ecosystem and cryptocurrency infrastructure provider.
👗 Adidas launches their latest “Virtual Dear” NFT collection
The collection includes 16 pieces representing Bored Ape Yacht Club, Gmoney, and PunkComics. Holders of the previous NFT collection will receive a new token as a replacement. Others can purchase “Virtual Gear” items on the marketplace.
💼 Web3 Entrepreneurial Resources
🔗 Aave and Uniswap Show How DeFi Keeps Working Amid FTX Crisis
While FTX contagion continues, the action on Aave and Uniswap reminds us: DeFi tools continue to work properly, unbothered.
🖼️ What Is a Generative Art NFT? Inside the Algorithmic Art Revolution
Generative art is a digital art style in which artists use algorithms as a tool. It’s been adopted by NFT artists on platforms like Art Blocks.
📲 Build Your Own dApp for iOS
How we implemented mobile dApp with my colleagues from Custom App, released the W3dding application (currently iPhone X and later supported), what we had to go through, and how to make your own native mobile dApp for iOS.
🏦 Web3 Fundraising
Matter Labs Nets $200M to Build zkSync Ethereum Scaling Platform
Yahaha raises $40M more for its user-generated, low-code immersive gaming platform
Buildspace raises $10m led by a16z
Yakoa raises $4.8M to help detect NFT fraud for platforms and creators
Virtualness makes $8 million in seed funding for Web3.0 startup
📓 The Week's Log: +100 Partnerships later
With Mobula, we have established over 100 partnerships with various players. We have recently realized the importance of categorizing & planning the type of partnership based on the project's progress.
From my experience and what I have seen in many companies, I can tell you that establishing collaborative partnerships between two separate entities sharing a common (or reversed) interest is a game changer.
It is precisely this interest that you need to identify and see at what point your project's maturity is optimal to respond to it.
If you create Web3 media, your objective will be to grow your community of people interested in Web3. In this case, you can partner with other Web3 media that share this common interest to grow their community of people interested in Web3. You could implement this strategy whenever you want. Still, after study, categorization, and prioritization, it will be recommended to do it as soon as you have created your social media site/page to take advantage of the partner's audience by being able to convert it to yours.
Suppose you are developing a Crypto tool and want to increase its usage by setting up a public API that gives access to certain information. Potential partners will probably be interested in accessing your data (reverse interest). It is best to contact them and establish partnerships as soon as you have a stable version to present and install. The opposite would create friction and waste of time.
I told you about the room strategy in a previous edition regarding the optimal partner search strategy. This strategy allows you to "scale" your partner search & closing process. If you want the details, here is the dedicated edition: Boost your partnerships with the room strategy.
+ I mainly talked about this topic during my conference for Epic Web3:
One point that I haven't necessarily covered much is how to find the "right partner". Someone recently shared with me a rather interesting method to judge the right partnerships: It's the 1+1 = 3 rule.
Think of the first 1 as your project
Think of the second 1 as a potential partner project
The sum of the two should equal 3, including +1 representing the value created by the partnership. This value created is, in most cases, the common (or reverse) interest I mentioned above.
This value must be directly perceived, quantifiable and trackable. This value may differ from the point of view of your project and the potential partner project. The challenge in getting the right partnerships & maximizing your chance to close them is finding the highest value created for your project but also for your potential partner's project.
Example to illustrate:
- You have a crypto accounting tool (1a)
- You have a partnership with a Web3 media (1b)For the crypto tool, 1a + 1b = lead/customer generation
The partnership will (potentially) generate quantifiable and trackable sales.For the Web3 media, 1a + 1b = Added value (via discount) for the audience
The partnership will (potentially) increase the engagement & audience of the community through an exclusive or high-interest offer.
To this "formula", I would add the variable X & Y, which represents the leverage of your project (X) and the leverage of your potential partner (Y). Your leverage must be equal (or slightly lower) to your potential partner's leverage if you want an optimal partnership. If the gap is too big, it won't work.
This reminds me of the My Orientation media (90K school orientation media) I co-founded a few years ago. We only grew by partnering with other media that also wanted to develop their audience (common interest) and had a similar number of subscribers (similar leverage).