Ads are not dead. They inspire us, make us wonder, or harken back to the most precious moments in life – all in a few minutes or even seconds. In an age of fast, ads might just be the perfect form of storytelling. Whatever you think of legacy media and the economic model that supports it, ads will always have a place in our culture and commerce. Perhaps that is why stars like Matthew McConaughey and Ryan Reynolds are doing so much work in this space.

So, what if, instead of passively creating or simply watching the next great ad, you could own it?

Web3’s first principles of ownership and community can empower creative minds to collaborate and develop advertising and marketing campaigns that they actually own – even after they are placed or aired.

Taking it a step further, imagine this ownership being made available on a marketplace to anyone who was moved by an ad and would want to collect it. What would Gatorade’s “Be Like Mike” spot go for today? Or Apple’s “1984” commercial?

Web3 can democratize the advertising and marketing creative process and unlock an entirely new ownership opportunity for creators.

To start, it’s instructive to think about the lifecycle of the ad game as it parallels the lifecycle of the web. Using The Chernin Group’s  Jarrod Dicker’s quick analogy as a key, here is how the ad game has been structured and what the future might look like:

https://twitter.com/jarroddicker/status/1487933624741675019?s=20

Web1: Mad Men

The iconic A&E show was a period piece on the ad agency in the 1960s: ad execs in a room, drink in hand, ruminating over what slogan is best to sell shaving cream or cigarettes. Then the pitch to the client. The Sterling Cooper model – that is, a strong, centralized firm – persists today and is led by companies like Wieden+Kennedy. W+K has been Nike’s top agency since its inception, delivering some of the most iconic ads and slogans in history. They are the gold standard. And like all gold standards, this is great for their clients and their employees, but prized firms like W+K are tough to break into for most aspiring or current creatives driven to work passionately on projects. There are countless marketing firms out there – but the portfolio of interesting clients and opportunities for inspired work is more limited. It’s simply a numbers game driven by bottom lines of both the clients and the firms. This model offers work, but it doesn’t guarantee creative freedom.

Web2: Influencers

The rise of social media ushered in the age of the content creator. Consumers now connect with people first, and then follow the brands they suggest. This created a great opportunity for brands: partner with influential creators to offer consumers the most valuable sales pitch – personal referrals – at a much lower cost than a high production ad. For instance, I know a guy who created a laundry detergent brand who said he would much rather invest in influencers than earned media.  But while our Instagram feeds may be filled with creators shilling for body image or wellness goods, the most impactful creator-produced ads were never meant to be. In 2020, TikTok user @420doggface208 posted a video of himself on a longboard drinking Ocean Spray cranberry juice. It has been viewed billions of times and earned Ocean Spray invaluable PR. It bought the creator a brand new truck. A win-win at face value. But did doggface leave some on the table?

Web3: AD DAOs

In creative work, the power of community can eclipse that of a corporation. Web3 offers the opportunity to capture what works in today’s centralized ad and marketing firm (i.e. some good ads) AND a growing movement for agency and ownership over one’s work. For instance, one of the most effective ad firms today is Ryan Reynolds’ Maximum Effort. Defining his strategy as “fastvertising,” Reynolds prioritizes moving quickly on the relevant moments in our culture to make memorable ads. Web3 offers scale to the “fastvertising” model. Imagine a community of creators, constantly ruminating on ideas, pitching to each other, and harnessing the power of others to make the most culturally relevant ads.

Most importantly, Web3 offers freedom for creatives outside of the traditional and centralized firm. As cited earlier, great clients = great work. But not every client is great and uninspired work might follow.

Web3 marketing incentivizes great work through real ownership.

https://twitter.com/cdixon/status/1495828090223833089?s=20&t=Y6DPQyTqcbwme-evIMFYfA

Building the modern marketing agency.

Welcome to YAH (Your Ad Here), a on-chain advertising community where creatives collaborate to make great ads they own.

Here’s how it would work.

Who.

Web2 democratized the talent stack – introducing countless influencers and creators to our lives. But there are plenty of people who have passion and ideas for great ads that aren’t influencers – and don’t have much of an interest in putting themselves first. YAH is designed for these people – both professional marketers (brands and independents) and ad makers, and anyone else looking to fill that creative space in their life. That includes writers, graphic designers, videographers, and producers.

How.

To start, we will invite creative minds to join the community. In the early days this will be on Discord, where the community will offer ad or marketing ideas (in addition to all the regular interactions that make up a vibrant channel). Those ideas can be well formulated or simply brainstorms.

Community members will vote on the ideas on pitch days and those pitches that reach a certain vote threshold will move to the next stage – the call.

The call will allow community members interested in being part of a project’s creation process to apply to work on the project. The application would be governed by the owner(s) of the original concept (“project owner”) and determined by what they think will help make their ad hit. (Projects that generate significant applications create immediate leverage with potential buyers/brands. Having a project idea that inspires a lot of creative people signals to potential brand partners that the ideas have real cultural relevance). The project owner will select the team to collaborate and create the ad, and each selected member will then be minted an NFT of the project, recognizing ownership.

What makes the ownership model so powerful is the built-in incentive for creatives to do excellent work. The more excellent the project, the greater potential value of their ownership.

Project idea formulation can come in two forms:

• Organically created and pitched by a community member (immediate term)

• Introduced by a partnered brand (long term)

Once the project team creates the ad or gets it pitch-ready for a brand partner, the team will work to find the perfect placement fit. Appearing again, Maximum Effort is pioneering this model.

As opposed to pitching ideas to a client, Reynolds has Maximum Effort (whose marketing side merged with the advertising software company MNTN in June) come up with an idea it loves and then look for an ideal client for it, much as a production company does.

If a brand partners with the team and picks up the ad, smart contracts can easily determine payment and ownership within the team. NFTs represent the ownership.

The second level of YAH’s model will be to develop partnerships with brands and organizations that use YAH as an agency to bid on and complete creative work.

Partnered brands would be “signed” as clients by DAO leadership and their projects would operate the same as any community-originated idea: the brand would share with the community the campaign they are interested in running and the community would take it from there. Members would pitch ideas, the best ideas advance, and the project owner would select their team to complete the project.

The token.

Community members are the driving force behind new ideas. First and foremost, members should be owners of the community itself. This will be recognized by holding the token. Tokens will not only encourage consistent engagement, but they will keep quality control high. Each early contributing community member will be airdropped a token that represents voting power over ad pitches. Frequent contributors will receive additional tokens – thereby increasing their voting influence and DAO governance.

The early days of the community will be filled with selected members and referrals. Future community members interested in becoming contributors will apply for a token – to establish commitment and quality control. The application will not be a resume or CV. Instead, it could be a simple question to demonstrate an applicant’s passion for ads or memorable marketing campaigns. DAO leadership will review applications. Application submissions and prior community engagement (i.e. on Discord) will determine contributing member status and token.

Each project owner will design and mint project NFTs. They will partner with YAH’s internal design team (or design one on their own) and the cost to mint will be covered by the DAO’s treasury. YAH will claim a small percentage of ownership (NFT) of each project to help keep the treasury flush. Token holders will have full oversight of the treasury.

Ownership.

As an original NFT holder, you certify your status as a creator of the ad or campaign. This ownership can be monetized in three ways.

First – when the ad gets picked up by a brand, the smart contract attached to your NFT will facilitate your payment from the brand to your wallet – as a one-time payment for work. After this transaction, the smart contract with the brand will expire. The NFT will continue to represent proof of creation, which confers its own benefits, namely as a limited edition NFT for what could be an epic ad campaign. (There is a long tail to this we will explore later). Then, the NFT holders (original creators of the ad) can choose to sell their NFT to a collector or interested third party – generating even more revenue for the creator. All secondary transaction proceeds will go to the creator/owner.

The second ownership model can be realized by using a smart contract to pay out royalties on ads that are placed multiple times. Say an ad campaign created by a team in YAH is picked up by a brand partner and that brand decides to make multiple buys with the ad. This model would allow the creator to continue realizing compensation for their work.

A final path to ownership doesn’t include the creative project team at all. Following the model of music NFTs – project teams can choose to fundraise for their project by offering ownership. For instance, a team could offer 5 percent equity of their project to five different non-creative owners. Those five would be minted a to-be-named “funder NFT” and once a brand partner picks it up, that 5 percent would be distributed. What makes this unique to many music NFTs is that not only do non-creative owners get to be early holders of the NFT – they could actually see financial upside.

Models.

Storytelling in Web3 is already off and running with efforts like Adimverse – which has greatly inspired this project. Powering ideas by a collective of creatives has the potential to truly democratize the marketing game and in turn provide even more value to partnered brands. Packy McCormick has written a bit about the power of decentralized storytelling.

Fan fiction — fans writing their own stories based off of Star Wars or Harry Potter or other popular IP — is surprisingly popular, but those creators don’t impact the core IP. Decentralized storytelling would let fans help create the universe and tell stories, all off of a central IP backbone, and own their favorite characters.

As one example, Jenkins the Valet is releasing a book written by Neil Strauss with input from Writer’s Room ticket holders. The book licenses characters from Bored Ape and Mutant Ape holders, and shares the profits from the book sales (done as NFTs) with them.

The First Ad.

Let’s move the theoretical into the practical.

Years ago, I was inspired by my own life experiences to write copy for an ad that I thought would be ideal for a shoe company with deep roots in competitive running, such as Nike.

With YAH, this project would be put up for a vote, and if approved, advanced to the call, the mint, and then creation stage. The team would then work to find the right buyer for it.

Which takes us to today. If you think this idea has legs, collect this piece. We’d love to welcome you to YAH.

Ads are not dead. They inspire us, make us wonder, or harken back to the most precious moments in life – all in a few minutes or even seconds. In an age of fast, ads might just be the perfect form of storytelling. Whatever you think of legacy media and the economic model that supports it, ads will always have a place in our culture and commerce. Perhaps that is why stars like Matthew McConaughey and Ryan Reynolds are doing so much work in this space.

So, what if, instead of passively creating or simply watching the next great ad, you could own it?

Web3’s first principles of ownership and community can empower creative minds to collaborate and develop advertising and marketing campaigns that they actually own – even after they are placed or aired.

Taking it a step further, imagine this ownership being made available on a marketplace to anyone who was moved by an ad and would want to collect it. What would Gatorade’s “Be Like Mike” spot go for today? Or Apple’s “1984” commercial?

Web3 can democratize the advertising and marketing creative process and unlock an entirely new ownership opportunity for creators.

To start, it’s instructive to think about the lifecycle of the ad game as it parallels the lifecycle of the web. Using The Chernin Group’s  Jarrod Dicker’s quick analogy as a key, here is how the ad game has been structured and what the future might look like:

https://twitter.com/jarroddicker/status/1487933624741675019?s=20

Web1: Mad Men

The iconic A&E show was a period piece on the ad agency in the 1960s: ad execs in a room, drink in hand, ruminating over what slogan is best to sell shaving cream or cigarettes. Then the pitch to the client. The Sterling Cooper model – that is, a strong, centralized firm – persists today and is led by companies like Wieden+Kennedy. W+K has been Nike’s top agency since its inception, delivering some of the most iconic ads and slogans in history. They are the gold standard. And like all gold standards, this is great for their clients and their employees, but prized firms like W+K are tough to break into for most aspiring or current creatives driven to work passionately on projects. There are countless marketing firms out there – but the portfolio of interesting clients and opportunities for inspired work is more limited. It’s simply a numbers game driven by bottom lines of both the clients and the firms. This model offers work, but it doesn’t guarantee creative freedom.

Web2: Influencers

The rise of social media ushered in the age of the content creator. Consumers now connect with people first, and then follow the brands they suggest. This created a great opportunity for brands: partner with influential creators to offer consumers the most valuable sales pitch – personal referrals – at a much lower cost than a high production ad. For instance, I know a guy who created a laundry detergent brand who said he would much rather invest in influencers than earned media.  But while our Instagram feeds may be filled with creators shilling for body image or wellness goods, the most impactful creator-produced ads were never meant to be. In 2020, TikTok user @420doggface208 posted a video of himself on a longboard drinking Ocean Spray cranberry juice. It has been viewed billions of times and earned Ocean Spray invaluable PR. It bought the creator a brand new truck. A win-win at face value. But did doggface leave some on the table?

Web3: AD DAOs

In creative work, the power of community can eclipse that of a corporation. Web3 offers the opportunity to capture what works in today’s centralized ad and marketing firm (i.e. some good ads) AND a growing movement for agency and ownership over one’s work. For instance, one of the most effective ad firms today is Ryan Reynolds’ Maximum Effort. Defining his strategy as “fastvertising,” Reynolds prioritizes moving quickly on the relevant moments in our culture to make memorable ads. Web3 offers scale to the “fastvertising” model. Imagine a community of creators, constantly ruminating on ideas, pitching to each other, and harnessing the power of others to make the most culturally relevant ads.

Most importantly, Web3 offers freedom for creatives outside of the traditional and centralized firm. As cited earlier, great clients = great work. But not every client is great and uninspired work might follow.

Web3 marketing incentivizes great work through real ownership.

https://twitter.com/cdixon/status/1495828090223833089?s=20&t=Y6DPQyTqcbwme-evIMFYfA

Building the modern marketing agency.

Welcome to YAH (Your Ad Here), a on-chain advertising community where creatives collaborate to make great ads they own.

Here’s how it would work.

Who.

Web2 democratized the talent stack – introducing countless influencers and creators to our lives. But there are plenty of people who have passion and ideas for great ads that aren’t influencers – and don’t have much of an interest in putting themselves first. YAH is designed for these people – both professional marketers (brands and independents) and ad makers, and anyone else looking to fill that creative space in their life. That includes writers, graphic designers, videographers, and producers.

How.

To start, we will invite creative minds to join the community. In the early days this will be on Discord, where the community will offer ad or marketing ideas (in addition to all the regular interactions that make up a vibrant channel). Those ideas can be well formulated or simply brainstorms.

Community members will vote on the ideas on pitch days and those pitches that reach a certain vote threshold will move to the next stage – the call.

The call will allow community members interested in being part of a project’s creation process to apply to work on the project. The application would be governed by the owner(s) of the original concept (“project owner”) and determined by what they think will help make their ad hit. (Projects that generate significant applications create immediate leverage with potential buyers/brands. Having a project idea that inspires a lot of creative people signals to potential brand partners that the ideas have real cultural relevance). The project owner will select the team to collaborate and create the ad, and each selected member will then be minted an NFT of the project, recognizing ownership.

What makes the ownership model so powerful is the built-in incentive for creatives to do excellent work. The more excellent the project, the greater potential value of their ownership.

Project idea formulation can come in two forms:

• Organically created and pitched by a community member (immediate term)

• Introduced by a partnered brand (long term)

Once the project team creates the ad or gets it pitch-ready for a brand partner, the team will work to find the perfect placement fit. Appearing again, Maximum Effort is pioneering this model.

As opposed to pitching ideas to a client, Reynolds has Maximum Effort (whose marketing side merged with the advertising software company MNTN in June) come up with an idea it loves and then look for an ideal client for it, much as a production company does.

If a brand partners with the team and picks up the ad, smart contracts can easily determine payment and ownership within the team. NFTs represent the ownership.

The second level of YAH’s model will be to develop partnerships with brands and organizations that use YAH as an agency to bid on and complete creative work.

Partnered brands would be “signed” as clients by DAO leadership and their projects would operate the same as any community-originated idea: the brand would share with the community the campaign they are interested in running and the community would take it from there. Members would pitch ideas, the best ideas advance, and the project owner would select their team to complete the project.

The token.

Community members are the driving force behind new ideas. First and foremost, members should be owners of the community itself. This will be recognized by holding the token. Tokens will not only encourage consistent engagement, but they will keep quality control high. Each early contributing community member will be airdropped a token that represents voting power over ad pitches. Frequent contributors will receive additional tokens – thereby increasing their voting influence and DAO governance.

The early days of the community will be filled with selected members and referrals. Future community members interested in becoming contributors will apply for a token – to establish commitment and quality control. The application will not be a resume or CV. Instead, it could be a simple question to demonstrate an applicant’s passion for ads or memorable marketing campaigns. DAO leadership will review applications. Application submissions and prior community engagement (i.e. on Discord) will determine contributing member status and token.

Each project owner will design and mint project NFTs. They will partner with YAH’s internal design team (or design one on their own) and the cost to mint will be covered by the DAO’s treasury. YAH will claim a small percentage of ownership (NFT) of each project to help keep the treasury flush. Token holders will have full oversight of the treasury.

Ownership.

As an original NFT holder, you certify your status as a creator of the ad or campaign. This ownership can be monetized in three ways.

First – when the ad gets picked up by a brand, the smart contract attached to your NFT will facilitate your payment from the brand to your wallet – as a one-time payment for work. After this transaction, the smart contract with the brand will expire. The NFT will continue to represent proof of creation, which confers its own benefits, namely as a limited edition NFT for what could be an epic ad campaign. (There is a long tail to this we will explore later). Then, the NFT holders (original creators of the ad) can choose to sell their NFT to a collector or interested third party – generating even more revenue for the creator. All secondary transaction proceeds will go to the creator/owner.

The second ownership model can be realized by using a smart contract to pay out royalties on ads that are placed multiple times. Say an ad campaign created by a team in YAH is picked up by a brand partner and that brand decides to make multiple buys with the ad. This model would allow the creator to continue realizing compensation for their work.

A final path to ownership doesn’t include the creative project team at all. Following the model of music NFTs – project teams can choose to fundraise for their project by offering ownership. For instance, a team could offer 5 percent equity of their project to five different non-creative owners. Those five would be minted a to-be-named “funder NFT” and once a brand partner picks it up, that 5 percent would be distributed. What makes this unique to many music NFTs is that not only do non-creative owners get to be early holders of the NFT – they could actually see financial upside.

Models.

Storytelling in Web3 is already off and running with efforts like Adimverse – which has greatly inspired this project. Powering ideas by a collective of creatives has the potential to truly democratize the marketing game and in turn provide even more value to partnered brands. Packy McCormick has written a bit about the power of decentralized storytelling.

Fan fiction — fans writing their own stories based off of Star Wars or Harry Potter or other popular IP — is surprisingly popular, but those creators don’t impact the core IP. Decentralized storytelling would let fans help create the universe and tell stories, all off of a central IP backbone, and own their favorite characters.

As one example, Jenkins the Valet is releasing a book written by Neil Strauss with input from Writer’s Room ticket holders. The book licenses characters from Bored Ape and Mutant Ape holders, and shares the profits from the book sales (done as NFTs) with them.

The First Ad.

Let’s move the theoretical into the practical.

Years ago, I was inspired by my own life experiences to write copy for an ad that I thought would be ideal for a shoe company with deep roots in competitive running, such as Nike.

With YAH, this project would be put up for a vote, and if approved, advanced to the call, the mint, and then creation stage. The team would then work to find the right buyer for it.

Which takes us to today. If you think this idea has legs, collect this piece. We’d love to welcome you to YAH.