I wanted to write this short GTM guide for founders for a long time. The trouble was, it seemed like a lot of work with a lot of nuance for different verticals. But over past three years I've collected bits and pieces on pretty much every aspect of it and it turned out that there are several major themes that hold early teams back in GTM. One being, they just overthink it.

Also my recent discussions with Twyne - shout out to them for pretty innovative idea on risk rebalancing of lending pools - just pushed me over the edge, that I should get it out there so more founders and aspiring founders would see that there's no rocket science - it's just common sense, a bit of a process, and lots of people connections.

This will work for a new project in any vertical, not just DeFi. You may search for different clients/wallets or decide to use different tools, but the framework is all the same because it ultimately still is gonna be about humans onchain. 😉

Start With 10 People Who Give a Sh*t

There’s a reason so many crypto products die before they launch or before anyone starts understanding what they bring to the table. It's not the tech. It's not the lack of money. It's that nobody cared when they showed up, because they never told anyone, and hoped everyone would notice.

Imagine you're building something cool in the DeFi space. I'll use this as an example, you substitute your "thing". Say you want to improve the capital efficiency of DeFi lending markets with credit delegation. Sounds like crypto-native, not protocol-bound, and above protocol-level innovation in DeFi — and already that makes your product complicated. So it's not for everybody and never will be. But you still need to make the on-ramp to caring stupidly simple.

This points you to sophisticated onchain borrowers and stakers as your crowd of interest. Your market isn’t the average user. It’s not moms or mobile game players. It’s degenerate capital allocators who live and breathe Aave, staking, Telegram, Discords, CT, and Farcaster. Those who know what MEV means and maybe care about anonymity or pseudonymity. You don’t need a thousand of them. You need ten that care.

That’s where your GTM starts. This should sound easy and non-complicated 😁

Treat Early Users Like Co-Founders

This is the most important mindset shift for any early-stage project or product. Especially if your team is mostly engineers and protocol designers.

You’re not "launching to the world." You’re inviting a few smart people into the lab with you. You're testing how your idea fits into their mental models of risk, leverage, and yield — and refining your product in public with their help.

The goal is to make these early users feel like co-owners of the narrative, not like beta testers. Make them feel like family, because they are! Who else would let you play with their money?

You want to hand-onboard them. One by one. Over calls, DMs, or intros from your network, from your angels, or other founders. Ask for intros from everyone you know, and you may be surprised to reach a hundred interested folks in no time. Warm intros are the most underutilised tool in the whole startup world.

If that doesn’t get you enough reach, cold DM your target avatars in places like Euler, Aave, Bankless DAO, MakerDAO governance forums, or try selected Farcaster channels.

There's also a good chance that if you get your co-founder on stage at a conference or on a podcast, people might be reaching out to you.

You can also go broader and use Nansen or DUNE to find the biggest stakers and the biggest borrowers on protocols of your interest. Use the tool of your choice (like X, TG, Debank) to get in touch with them and invite them to be part of something bigger. Share the vision and get your narrative out there.

Forget Tools. Just Start with Sheets, X, TG.

Before you spin up a fancy CRM or some questing platform, keep it simple - you only need three tools:

• A Telegram group (or private group chat),

• A spreadsheet (or Airtable),

• *A Verified Organization X (Twitter) account* that looks alive.

That’s it. That’s your CRM, your community, and your face. Every connection and contact must be recorded and shared in one place. If you don't get into habit of doing it now, it will turn into real chaos and lost opportunities later!

One simple thing, make sure you touch base with these connection regularly. Whether they said yes or no. First No is often only a foreplay before Yes. 😉

Everything else is noise in the beginning. Later, you can add Farcaster channels, mini-apps, onchain referral tracking, whatever. But for now: your job is to talk to people and get them to talk back.

Your Team Is the First Distribution Channel

One of the hardest transitions for an all-engineer team is becoming your own GTM engine. It’s also the most important. This is not to get your first users - this is to lay the foundation of trust and authority for scaling time.

Your co-founders must be visible. Doesn’t matter if they’re shy. Doesn’t matter if they’re not “social people.” If you're building something for crypto natives, the game is played on Telegram, X, and Farcaster — and your team has to show up where the game is. Choose one platform to keep it simple.

If on X, Affiliations are a great tool if you can afford a Verified Organization subscription. It helps you boost everyone and connect the dots. If you're not targeting CT people, don't waste money on this.

This doesn’t mean becoming influencers. It means leaving breadcrumbs of your vision and authority — every day. That's what people will check after you DM them or talk to them.

Topics Trees Are Neat Trick To Align

Start with building topics trees for each team member around her/his area of expertise. This is a great little trick that can save you a lot of anxiety later. It will help you make your message and content look consistent and easy to produce over time.

Example for a 4-Person Team & How to Use It

• Founder/UX person

  • Main topics: Vision & Culture, Fundraising Tips, Trade-Offs in protocol UX/UI

  • Sub-questions: “How to simplify UX for advanced users?”, “What’s our 3-year product vision?”, "What other problems are there to solve in DeFi?", "How to survive VC DD", etc.

• Finance Wiz

  • Main topics: Economic Design, Relevant Industry Stats and News, Financial Modelling

  • Sub-questions: “Weekly progress stats”, “Fin. modelling frameworks useful in DeFi”, etc.

• Security Eng.

  • Main topics: Smart Contract Security, Web3 Security, Audit practices

  • Sub-questions: “Best Practices for Auditing DeFi Protocols?”, “How to run automated security test?”, "What we did last week," etc.

• BD/GTM

  • Main topics: GTM frameworks, Objection Handling, Email-to-DM Funnels

  • Sub-questions: “How to find new customers each day?”, “Best scripts for intro emails?”, "Events you can meet us at," etc.

Use weekly sprints: each member picks 1–2 sub-questions, writes or records a 5–10-minute voice note answering it, then transcribes and refines into 3–5 tweets or a full thread with a strong hook, possibly an image. One person can use CreatorBuddy and Hypefury to help batch and polish and schedule content across the board.

The whole week of content for everyone can be prepared in 1-2 hour sprint on Friday.

What matters is that it looks alive from the outside. That you’re building with intent — and others can sense the momentum.

If you want a short guide on how to build your Topics Tree, drop me a DM.

Use Exclusivity as Fuel (but Don’t Fake It)

The early user journey in crypto is emotional, not logical. You’re not selling them a product. You’re inviting them into a movement — a project with energy, direction, and unfinished business.

The best visual I’ve seen of this is from Emily Lai and Rabin at Hype. Their funnel starts with external FOMO (hearing about something cool), moves into community consideration (joining Telegram, poking around), and only becomes loyalty once the user feels included and seen.

This is why you ship small updates in public. Why you post progress 1-2 times, or even 3 times, a week. Why you give early users rituals (like weekly calls, AMAs, dev logs). And why you reward contributors with visibility (OG roles, shout-outs, insider alpha).

None of this requires money. It requires intention. It requires caring.

Invite-Only Is Underrated

If you’re targeting high-signal users (and with our imaginary DeFi innovation you should), go private first.

Host an invite-only Telegram group.
Host intimate dinners or drinks during conferences.
Make it easier for early users to say “yes” by showing them that they’re early, special, and trusted. Tokenize some memorable moments or even custom-made art for those sharing your journey early. Something they can flash around later when you become famous. Something you can find by later.

This intimate approach is especially useful in DeFi, where you’re asking people to trust you with capital. Trust is built face-to-face or 1:1 in chat, not through memes or billboards.

Weekly Visibility Rhythm for Imaginary DeFi Startup

Here’s a basic rhythm you can follow for your first 12 weeks. It doesn't take more than 1 hour of your time, but makes your project look alive and kicking:

MONDAY:

• Post a product or roadmap update

• Reach out to 5 potential users or partners

• Message early users and thank them publicly

WEDNESDAY:

• Share something from the team’s internal build process

• Ask for one simple action (join Telegram, comment on post, refer someone)

• Reach out to 5 potential users or partners

FRIDAY:

• Post something personal or behind-the-scenes

• Run lightweight campaigns (polls, meme contests, bug bounty feedback form)

• Reach out to 5 potential users or partners

TUESDAY and THURSDAY:

• Use it to browse your lists and reach out to other projects you like, admire, or want to partner with

• Post or repost something that sparked your interest (careful with reposts, stay within your topic tree)

This rhythm creates momentum — a heartbeat. And if you're consistent, people will start to sense you're building something inevitable. If you have a dedicated BD person, this can become a daily rhythm.

Avoid These GTM Killers

Here are the 6 fastest ways to destroy an early DeFi community:

1. Launching a token too early. It becomes a distraction and traps you in short-term incentives.

2. Over-branding. You don’t need a perfect logo. You need people.

3. Faking hype. Hype without substance feels cheap, and you’ll lose the real ones.

4. Over-engineering your stack. Stick to sheets and X. You’re not ready for CRM automation or questing platforms just yet.

5. Not posting because you're afraid of being cringe. It’s not cringe. It’s visibility.

6. Trying to be everywhere. Be in one or two places: X and Farcaster, or X and YouTube. That’s it. (you are on Telegram already anyway )

Final Thought: Everyone Is a Part of BD on a Small Team

You don’t need a growth or marketing team yet. You are the growth team. Your team is the face. Your users are your echo chamber. People like doing business with other people. Especially with people they like and can relate to. That's why you're showing up with your thoughts.

From 0 to 10 → hand-hold and whisper.
From 10 to 100 → give rituals and rewards.
From 100+ → open up the gates, but still keep your inner circle tight.

DeFi doesn’t grow by accident. It grows by conversation, by belief, and by people who give a sh*t.

1. Start small and loud. 10 users > 10,000 followers.

2. Make your team visible. Content is not optional, you're laying the groundwork for an empire.

3. Leverage your knowledge. Produce content consistently around topics you live by every day. It makes it easy and will clarify your thinking.

4. Leverage your network. Warm intros are gold, and you can get more of them than you think. Just ask. Cold DMs are still useful.

5. Collect your connections in one place. Don't let names and wallets slip away because on of you got busy or left.

6. Stay ritualistic. Make weekly actions and daily posts the baseline.

7. Invite-first, hype-later. Earn trust before you try to scale it.

8. You need to reach out. Assume this as the standard. Not the other way around.

I know that talking to people sometimes looks scary, but look at the bright side, you will do most of it online. No need to dress up and shower. You can do it from the comfort of your sofa 😃 I'm kidding, of course. Go and get out of that room and shake hands! And don't overthink it.

Till next time, let's BUILD BETTER!

BFG

Coming Up Next:

So I've again skipped my favorite underdog themes topic but it's coming. And I also have very cool topic in the works about what summer jobs you can choose to become future-proof for any industry and any future. You'll love it. 💌

Stay tuned!
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