Every now and then, a founder friend will DM me asking for GTM advice — usually along the lines of “how should we launch?” or “what campaigns worked for you?” And while I get the curiosity, I also have to remind myself: this is literally what I do for a living. I build go-to-market strategies. I test messaging. I manage community reactions. I ship growth. And every hour I spend answering that DM is an hour I’m not spending on Elfa(www.elfa.ai) — the product I’m currently pouring every ounce of energy into.
Still, I get the appeal of “how to marketing” content. I used to write a lot of it — partly because I had thoughts to share, but mostly because I needed people to know I existed. I’d just been laid off. I didn’t know what I was doing with my life. And in between failed job interviews and restless nights, writing became my way of saying, “Hey, I know how this works. Hire me.”
Eventually, someone did. And from there, I got to work with some great projects — all of them radically different. I launched four protocols across four completely different cycles, with four totally different teams, under four completely different sets of constraints. What I learned, over and over, is that there is no single formula. What works for one team will fall flat for another. Everything changes depending on market timing, AI hype cycles, team funding, founder personality, and — most of all — user psychology.
But people love copying each other. Especially in crypto. And that’s how we end up with endless forks, endless quest campaigns, endless cookie-cutter brand launches that all start to blur together. The truth is, you can’t copy GTM. It has to come from your product, your team, your culture, and your audience. Otherwise, you’re just doing expensive cosplay.
Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about how crypto marketing has evolved.
1. Airdrops used to feel like a gift — now they’re expected.
2. People used to be rewarded for using a protocol, but now they expect points just for talking about it.
3. And because there are too many altcoins and no more guaranteed Binance pumps, even listing strategy is no longer a sure thing. DEX-only teams are everywhere.
Distribution isn’t simple anymore.
At the same time, we’ve got projects like Cluely turning marketing into a sheer volume game. Hire 50 interns. Buy up dead TikTok accounts. Post nonstop. Get in front of people before anyone else does. I don’t even think they believe their product is better — they just know visibility beats quality when attention is short. And sadly, they’re kind of right.
It’s weird how Web2 and Web3 approach this differently. In Web2, companies learn what people love and build monetization around that. In Web3, we pay people to maybe become users someday. Then we pay third-party tools to track those people, and then pay moderators to figure out which ones are bots. We spend more time optimizing point systems than improving the product, and in the end, we still don’t know who our real users are.
Someone once said to me, “Well yeah, but maybe our product just isn’t good enough yet — that’s why we need incentives to get people in.” I get the sentiment, but I don’t buy it. If you’ve built something, raised money, and are launching in public, then you do have something to offer. The problem isn’t the product — it’s that you’re trying to act way bigger than you are. You’re trying to front-load growth instead of earning it.
And I get it — that pressure’s real. Especially when TGE is treated like IPO. Especially when your valuation is too high. Especially when you're chasing hype in a bear market. Everyone’s in a rush. But not everyone survives the rush. Pendle had a rough first year too — and look where they are now.
Here’s the thing: I don’t think product has to come before marketing. That’s a myth. With AI, open dev infra, and forkable codebases, most crypto products don’t even look that different anymore. Distribution is the differentiator now. But it has to grow with the product. The best marketing comes from truly understanding who your product is for, meeting those people where they are, and speaking in a voice they trust.
Instead, most teams are trying to get anyone to talk about them. Doesn’t matter if that person’s actually a user. Doesn’t matter if they’ll ever come back. Just talk. Just post. Just make noise. It’s exhausting.
But also, I get it. Founders need to hit numbers. Marketers need to show movement. Even if the strategy’s flawed, it’s tempting when you have nothing else to show.
Still, every crypto project is a startup. You’re supposed to be iterating, breaking, testing, learning. Marketing is no exception. It’s not a one-and-done announcement. It’s a feedback loop.
So here’s how I think about it now:
Talk to the people most likely to love your product.
Let them use it.
Listen when they’re confused, and turn that into content.
Notice what they love, and double down on it.
Don’t be afraid to repeat yourself — memes work.
And don’t take yourself too seriously. Shitpost. Have fun. This is still the internet.
At Elfa, we’ve been trying to follow that logic. We don’t use quest platforms. We don’t reward people just for bridging or swapping or clicking buttons. We try to keep noise out of the product loop, because we care about building something people actually want to come back to. We make good content. We talk to our users. We ship like crazy. That’s it.
Oh — and we’re hiring interns. Like actual interns. People who are messy and excited and maybe don’t know much yet but want to learn. We’re not looking for ex-MBBs or marketing robots. We want curious people who care. If you know someone like that, send them our way.
We’ll figure it out together.
shubit
Support dialog
my email: shubit@elfa.ai