Bitcoin 2021 Recap: Conference Summary & Event-based Crypto Marketing | Ep. 38

Ty Smith0:00

Welcome to another episode of the Crypto Marketing Show. I'm Ty Smith, with me is Liz. Today we are going to recap our experiences in Miami at Bitcoin 2021. It was an interesting weekend, or week I guess, for a lot of us. Yeah, so Liz, this is kind of your first crypto event, right?

Liz0:28

Yeah, it was my first one. It was a really big dive into the community, but I loved it. It was awesome seeing it in action, especially after 16 months of not seeing any action at all.

Ty Smith0:52

It was like the exact going from the couch with not talking to anyone for COVID for a full year into like really aggressive, in-your-face networking and the bull market's up and you have a million things to talk about.

Liz1:05

Yeah, it was crazy. It was a great experience. I loved being exposed to all the new projects, all the people working on them. There were some heavy hitters to see there, so I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Ty Smith1:22

And you've been to a lot of the cannabis conferences, right? Like, at least a dozen?

Liz1:29

Yeah, I've been to a lot of cannabis conferences and events, and I've got to say, tech people really know how to party. And that is someone coming from cannabis, so I think crypto won, I've got to say.

Ty Smith1:41

I mean, yeah, the conferences are, I will say, a lot different, because I've been going to these crypto conferences for years at this point, and they are very different when the market's up versus when they're not. It's a little bit more of everyone consoling each other when Bitcoin was at $3,000 back in, I don't know, World Crypto Con, I think, is when that was like the price action movement and people were not so thrilled, I guess.

Liz2:07

Yeah, I would say the sentiments were definitely happy, much happier than maybe they would have been in the past, but everyone seemed to be in a very good mood.

Ty Smith2:22

Yeah, the open bar helped.

Liz2:23

Yeah, that too. That too.

Ty Smith2:24

Yeah, so I mean, I wanted to just kind of like go through, obviously this is a marketing podcast, so we should touch on the kind of event-based marketing that we saw there, as well as just, I don't know, who the key players were. Going back to comparing Bitcoin 2021 to Bitcoin 2019, which I think was the most recent one because 2020 was canceled, there was significantly more being spent on marketing at this event, like significantly more.

Ty Smith2:53

And this event was way bigger, like way more people. I think 12,000 was the number that we had in our heads going into it, but I think it was honestly a lot more than that. And that doesn't even include the people that were just in Miami for the week that didn't want to go through the effort of buying the tickets and things like that. It was just, I don't know, you forget, I guess, how live and well the industry is, and then you go to one of these events and see people that have been in the game for a long period of time, and you forget that like Bitcoin only goes up on a long-term kind of basis, like as an industry, not talking about price or anything, and it's really exciting when you experience that.

Liz3:29

Yeah, it was an extremely exciting time, and to see the amount of marketing and branding kind of in the wild was really cool and really fascinating to see how people played on that. I really loved like Tony Hawk. I thought that that was, I think that was my biggest surprise. I didn't know that he was involved in the crypto space at all.

Liz3:53

And I think seeing his halfpipe and how he did the skate decks, it was really exclusive, but very like home to how he is and his brand and how he is as a celebrity, and how he worked with Swipe to bring that together and make that a reality. I think that was my favorite marketing and branding experience from the conference itself, and I was really excited to see something like that. I think it was like a huge scale of marketing, too.

Ty Smith4:24

Yeah, and I wish I had got one of those decks. It was like early in the morning, I think, on Sunday. I was not at the event, and that's like the one thing from the event, like actual conference event, that I wish I was at that I wasn't at.

Liz4:39

I know, same. I thought it was later in the afternoon, but it was like really, really early in the morning, so I missed it as well. But it was so cool to see later in the day, and people were actually like skating on the halfpipe. Money from that went toward, proceeds from that went toward his project to build skate parks elsewhere. So I think it tied in just so well, and I think that it was done so well, and I would love to see other things like that in the future at other conferences and crypto events.

Ty Smith5:11

Yeah, and I mean another thing as far as, this isn't so much marketing, but I guess it kind of is because it's part of one company's marketing strategy, is did you catch the keynote speech from Jack Mallers at the end of the event when they announced the El Salvador thing and there's a bunch of other things they were announcing?

Liz5:29

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was outside for it, but I heard it.

Ty Smith5:32

Yeah, no, it was like, so I wasn't familiar with him before this event, and I wasn't familiar with the company that he leads either. And I, the more I looked into him and sort of what he did at this event specifically, was I was more impressed. I honestly thought they had hired a professional like public speaker whose job was, like I thought it was like a Gary V kind of speech that he gave.

Ty Smith5:57

And you forget that like, a lot of people think like entrepreneurship's kind of easy, but you forget that like to be a really successful entrepreneur, you have to be so multi-talented. Like you have to be able to successfully lead an organization of people towards like a common goal. You have to be able to understand marketing and be good at that, accounting, all those things. And then there's like a whole X-factor that will really take your company to the next level, and Jack Mallers brings that with his ability to public speak and like just motivate people in such a engaging way.

Liz6:26

Yeah, and his name really popped up all over the place. I feel like as soon as I heard him and saw that name, I've been seeing it everywhere ever since the conference happened, especially on Twitter. Everyone is talking about him. I feel like he's crypto's darling right now.

Ty Smith6:48

Yeah. No, say what you will about the crypto community being kind of jaded and like angry behind a keyboard, when the crypto community gets behind someone that they like, that they feel is like promoting crypto as a whole, they really, they really will back you up.

Liz7:02

Yeah, I totally see that, and I think he had a really great stage presence. I think the way he introduced what he's doing was really powerful, and just even seeing the amount of people outside and who were lining up to hear him speak and the eruption of applause at the end of that. I mean, there were people like singing and literally singing and dancing, and it was really, really something to see. It was very powerful.

Ty Smith7:33

Yeah, and El Salvador legalizing Bitcoin as legal tender, it's obviously awesome news. Is El Salvador the biggest country in the world? No, of course not. But like to be in that environment where that announcement's coming out at like the biggest freaking event for Bitcoin in the past two years, after like this bull market, like it really in a lot of people's eyes, I think, especially when it was like the messaging was being delivered by Jack Mallers, who's like the Gary V of crypto in my mind now, it was just like, I don't know, it was a moment. It was a moment that like the community, you don't get too many moments like that.

Liz8:07

No, I totally agree, and to see something like that in crypto, it was very new and refreshing to me. I really liked seeing the community rally in that way, because especially like we've only been connected through Twitter and the internet and other methods for the last like 16 months, and so to see such positive reception toward someone building something like that was, it gave me a lot of hope and faith in crypto.

Ty Smith8:37

Yeah, I mean, so beyond what we just spoke about, there was obviously a ton of different kind of unique and creative marketing things that we saw. I know we were discussing them together at the event and a little bit after it. What else stood out to you?

Liz8:51

I really liked Playboy's NFTs. I don't know if that's so much marketing, but it's definitely branding. I think it's interesting how they're trying to really have a foot in this emerging market zone. They are licensing their brand to tons of different players, like even in cannabis, actually. Like, it's crazy. And so to see Playboy at something like that and actually interacting in a way that's organic with the community, I thought was a lot more reputable than I thought, you know, someone like Playboy would do.

Liz9:20

I was very surprised. They actually worked with artists who are already NFT artists in the space and already known in the space, and gave them a platform, gave them a place to show, and gave them a place that they can actually, earn a significant amount of money, too, and exposure. And so I really thought that that was a commendable tactic on Playboy's side, instead of just like creating their own NFTs and just totally banking off that themselves.

Liz9:52

They had like a real, they showed that they had a real stake in the industry, and I thought that that was important. And I mean, they didn't even have a party. Like, typically you would think, Playboy, oh, they're going to show up, they're going to close out. No, they were really there just to hype up artists and to show off these NFTs, and I think that that was really commendable on their end.

Ty Smith10:25

Yeah, it was pretty cool. They've definitely transitioned from like a media magazine company into really a whole like pure branding company, and they're kind of I guess just slapping that on on different things, NFTs being one of the latest. Yeah, no, it was cool. They had a pretty understated presence, but still they were, I don't know, it was cool to see them. It's always cool to see which companies are getting involved.

Liz10:46

Yeah, from a mainstream standpoint. And then Nexo, on the other hand, they were the ones who sponsored the entire NFT gallery. And I thought that that was also, really cool on their end as well to create something that was so interactive. There were so many cool artists there.

Liz11:09

Like, the actual artists were there with their art, explaining to people how it worked, showing people how to make it be this like augmented reality piece of art that you can take with you. There were, the people who had kind of like the play on Andy Warhol, and I thought that that was just such a brilliant thing to have. And I personally love art and love seeing things like that, so I was often in the NFT gallery.

Ty Smith11:33

Yeah, I was as well. One thing, you know, we're talking about positives of things that we saw, one thing that I felt was really a missed opportunity regarding NFTs, and it's actually two things. One is I thought the tickets to the event should have been NFTs, just why not? Such a missed opportunity there.

Ty Smith11:58

Yeah, just why not? It's so easy. It's like, I don't know, it's not going to cost anything. I guess it depends when you minted it, but yeah. And then you get to keep it forever, too, and you could just scan it. I don't know. Maybe the tech isn't fully as much there as I think it is, but I thought that was a missed opportunity.

Liz12:19

Ooh, that would have been really cool.

Ty Smith12:20

Yeah, I also thought in the NFT art gallery, it should have been more like for sale. Like you could have scanned the QR code, would have opened it up on OpenSea, you could have placed a bid right there and bought it and then have it sent to your phone. I thought that would have been kind of cool.

Liz12:37

Yeah, and there were some, like at the end especially, a lot of artists were selling things off, and there were some things you could scan to bid, but it really wasn't extremely obvious. And I do think they could have done a better job with that, because I did hear a lot of people asking like, 'Oh, how did you bid on that? How did you do that?'

Liz12:59

And there was no really like instructional how-to. You really had to go in and kind of figure it out yourself, which is maybe something that speaks to crypto as a whole, because a lot of it you do have to go in and figure it out yourself. But yeah, even by the end, I was asking like one of my favorite artists were there, and I was like, 'Hey, how can I buy your stuff?' And they were like, 'Oh, well, you can just buy it outright. It's just here for sale.' And that was not something that was really known, I think, to a lot of people, so it could have been way, way more obvious.

Ty Smith13:14

I like, this is kind of a tangent, but I don't think I'm buying physical art like anytime soon. I think I'm just sticking to NFTs.

Liz13:20

Wow, that's a bold statement.

Ty Smith13:24

Yeah. I don't know. I think that that is a whole another topic for a different, for a different episode, but yeah.

Liz13:31

That, yeah, we're going to have probably have to get into another episode on that, especially just coming, like coming from art, it's really crazy, because you're not the first person I've heard say that. And it's almost like, where is this going then? Like, are people going to be still painting on something physical or drawing on something physical and making that an NFT, or is this going to completely go into like a digital art place?

Liz13:59

I'm curious what that future looks like and how people are going to value physical art, too, because is that something that people are going to purchase later on, or are they just going to have screens in their house all over the place that then has their digital art on it? Like, what does that future look like?

Ty Smith14:28

Yeah, I definitely want to do another topic on that, because I wrote pretty extensively on that on a LinkedIn post, and it got pretty good positive feedback from everyone, and I want to build upon it.

Liz14:37

Yeah, no, I totally agree. I'd love to talk more about that.

Ty Smith14:43

Before we did this, before we started recording, we tweeted something about just people recommending what options we should discuss that they really liked from the conference, and I saw OKCoin had tweeted at us a couple things. Did you catch what that was? It was something with masks, I think, or...

Liz15:11

Yeah, they, so I actually have one of their masks, too, and it says on it, 'The future is going to be OK,' and, obviously, playing on OKCoin.

Liz15:22

And I thought the design was really cool. They just did a massive rebranding, and I think it looks amazing. It's very, very modern, really bright colors, very approachable for people who I think didn't know so much what they did or what that brand is about. I think they did a really good job there. And then, of course, they were tweeting about it and adding us, so, of course, we had to mention it. Someone else that I think did a really good job, too, was Blockchain.com. They were the ones at the beginning handing out the fanny packs, and it had like the sunscreen and sunglasses in it. And I think that one of the OKCoin masks was maybe in that. I could be misremembering that, though. I had a bunch of, a bunch of gear after the conference.

Ty Smith15:43

Yeah, no, I mean, there was a lot of cool options. The eToro thing was awesome. What did it say? It said like 'instant liquidity' or something on the water bottles they were giving out.

Liz16:07

Yeah, literally on the water bottle. It was so smart. And then they had it on some of the barstool-type tables, too, so it was literally eToro everywhere for anything having to do with like drinks and liquidity. I thought that was really, really clever of them.

Ty Smith16:15

Yeah, and that conference, the, at the conference, the car was cool. That was for Sportsbet giveaway a Lamborghini. Were you there for when they finally gave, I wasn't there. I didn't catch when they finally gave it away, but I know you could have scanned a QR code and, I think, registered, and then they entered you in a thing for a Lamborghini. I don't know. I'm weird about that stuff where it's like I feel, in a sense, like, I don't know, too embarrassed to go up and do that. But like, there's not that many people at these conferences, and like, you really should be entering these things to get like a 1 in 12,000 chance to get a Lamborghini. Like, you actually will get the Lamborghini.

Liz16:53

I know. I didn't even think to enter either. I had no idea that was going on. I just thought people were like taking pictures with it. And so I didn't even know there was a place to like go and do that, so I was really regretting that after. But the girl actually who won, I did see her get announced, and I think that she took the money instead of the actual car, which I would have done that, too. Would you take the money or would you take the car?

Ty Smith17:09

I am like a numbers person, and I would call my accountant and try to figure out what the tax advantages is of each one and make my decision that way, if I'm being totally honest.

Liz17:19

I think, I think honestly the tax advantages would come from taking the money, because then you can like, you know, reinvest it. But maybe also you could sell the car, I don't know. I know that I probably will never get a Lambo in my life. Not because I don't want one, like that'd be great, but like, I don't know. I think I need a sturdier vehicle personally.

Ty Smith17:40

Yeah, well, at the World Crypto Con in Las Vegas in, I guess it was like a year and a half at this point, they gave away a Tesla. It was actually a huge like event. Like, it was actually fun. Like, everyone was really pumped about it. To be honest, I don't remember what the company was that gave it away, so maybe it's not exactly the best use of marketing money.

Ty Smith18:08

But they had set it up in a way that was like, you get the Tesla, they had put it in some kind of like, they wrapped it like in some kind of smart legal entity, like an LLC that was tax advantaged in some way, so you weren't required to pay the taxes on it, because that is a big deal. If you're getting a $100,000 car, you're expected to pay 30 grand on it in taxes, which isn't realistic for everyone. But I don't know, it's like, it's cool. There's some things that are too good to be true, and that definitely applies to other industries, but there's also like a lot of things that seem too good to be true in crypto that like are just because people made a shit ton of money in the past year and are like giving back, in a sense.

Liz18:36

Yeah, I totally agree. I think it really depends with that. And then you know, that is, that is an issue, too, is you spend all this money on marketing and on this like big ploy, and then you don't even remember the actual brand name. Like, there's definitely things that happened at the conference where then on the other side of that, like I don't remember their names, but it was this really cool like thing. And I'm like, 'Oh, well, that was the really cool thing.' Like, they had that entire gaming section. I don't remember who sponsored that at all. All I know is that they had really cool games to play when I didn't feel like talking to people anymore.

Ty Smith19:17

Yeah, it was EBD. It was a company behind Mt. Gox.

Liz19:20

Ah, okay, okay. Yeah, I feel like there's some places where maybe, and maybe that's like my own miss, but I think that there is sometimes like a little bit of a gap where brands can become a little bit more memorable in the things that they're sponsoring and deploying during those kind of events, because like, people are obviously going to remember the really cool thing, but how do you also make it memorable around that brand and make it relevant to the brand?

Liz19:53

Like, that's why I said the Tony Hawk halfpipe was the best one, because I think it fed so much into obviously who Tony Hawk is. It was super memorable. I know exactly who sponsored that, Swipe. You know, they worked to donate money to the skate parks. Like, I remember everything about that. And maybe it's also because Tony Hawk is so mainstream, but I really felt like that was a great fit.

Ty Smith20:27

Yeah, and there was also the, the shitcoin toilet paper. Was that Billfodl that did that?

Liz20:38

You know, I don't know. We'd have to ask Jared. He found, he found out. I also don't remember for that one, but the shitcoin toilet paper was hilarious. I actually did see that in the bathrooms, too. Someone actually had brought it in to use in the women's bathroom.

Ty Smith20:51

Yeah, I think it was Billfodl, which is a cool company, by the way. I spoke with the owner for a while. They make the, like the hardware storage on like steel, so like it's fireproof and floodproof and all that stuff. I ended up getting one. It's pretty cool. But yeah, I think it was them who had it, but it was such a good idea. It was like, and I don't know how they found so many shitcoins to put on there, because it was like every single square of toilet paper had a different shitcoin and explanation of what it was on the toilet paper. Like, that's pretty, I don't know, that's creative.

Liz21:29

Yeah, and time, I mean, that probably took some time to put that together and print and make sure it was all right. So I thought that that was really smart.

Liz21:42

I also thought it was really cool how they had the actual Bitcoin car there, and, you know, how they partnered with Strike on that. I don't know if Ed Carpenter was actually there, but, you know, it's really something for a driver to come out and say, 'Hey, like, you know, I'm turning down the chips and beer sponsors and calling them out almost by name and saying, 'I actually want to drive for something that's meaningful and for financial literacy and for financial autonomy.'

Liz22:05

And he really came out and said that. I thought that that was really powerful, and I wish almost that they had the Bitcoin car positioned where the Lamborghini was, because like the Lambo was up front right where you walk in, and the Bitcoin car was a little further back, like in the conference itself. And I thought that that should have more of a, I thought that the placement could have been better for that.

Ty Smith22:28

Yeah, I actually didn't see it until social media.

Liz22:31

It was super hidden. Like, it was not very well placed, in my opinion, but, you know.

Ty Smith22:38

Something I thought that was also cool, did you catch the, the dumpster full of Venezuelan cash?

Liz22:44

I did. That was crazy. I saw people like kind of going, like going through it, too, and I didn't know at first that it was like essentially an installation. I thought there were just people going through the trash, and I was like, 'That is really weird. Why are they doing that?'

Ty Smith23:02

Yeah, it was, so to illustrate it for everyone that wasn't at the event, it was basically like a garbage dumpster, and it was full of $50 bill like Venezuelan dollars, which like, like looks a lot like just US dollars, so people are kind of freaking out and picking it up off the floor, people throwing it around. If you don't, if you're not familiar with Venezuela, like the reason they did that is like because they're dealing with absurd hyperinflation to the point that 50 Venezuelan dollars is like less than a tenth of a penny.

Liz23:31

It cost like $133 for McDonald's french fries. I don't know if you saw that sign.

Ty Smith23:36

No, I think, I think you're off there. I think it's even less. I think, I mean, I think more money, dollar amount, for that. Like, I did the calculation. It was like less than a third of a third of something of a penny per dollar. That is insane. So basically, you would need like a million Venezuelan dollars to have like a dollar.

Ty Smith24:01

You, yeah, you basically need like rubber bands amount of cash to buy anything. Like to pay for parking probably you need like, I don't know, 100 bills. I don't know, I'm just making it up, but like that's the, like if you were getting doing it in $50 bills, which is what they had there, that's what it would have been. And that whole thing, you know, all around it, obviously wasn't just done just for, you know, the art sake. It was, it was a promotional placement for Cake Wallet, which was kind of cool.

Liz24:26

Yeah, no, I thought that that was, I thought that really stood out. It's, it's crazy to think about that, and I mean, obviously, it's something like the Bitcoin conference, it's really important to focus on inflation and how that can even affect us here. I mean, just over this year, we've seen a 5% increase in most prices, so...

Ty Smith24:53

Yeah, it's, Chipotle just increased their prices across the board, 4% on everything. These are, these are trying times we're living in.

Liz24:58

We're going to have to do a down payment just for some, a side of guac. It's going to start to get pretty pricey, those avocados.

Ty Smith25:09

Yeah, we might be up there with the Venezuelan dollars, taking a full stack of cash to get Chipotle.

Liz25:16

Yeah, it might just happen. We're going to have to really, I don't know if you're a part of their rewards program, but really going to have to...

Ty Smith25:23

Oh, come on, Liz, you know I am.

Liz25:24

I'm totally in their rewards program. Actually, you know, I got an email today that California has free queso, apparently, as a promo for today and the reopening of California, so...

Ty Smith25:44

Huh. Interesting. Yeah, I'm a, I'm a daily Chipotleyer, if that's the, the term. Near daily, at least.

Liz25:51

I think now it is because you said it, but I don't know if that was a term before.

Ty Smith25:59

Well, I'm a trendsetter when it comes to Chipotle pop culture.

Liz26:07

Ah, perfect. Talking to, talking to a real trendsetter here.

Ty Smith26:12

Yeah. By the way, Chipotle podcast coming to you live June 15th, 2021. All right, let's go over, unless there's anything else you have regarding sponsorships, I definitely want to go over like kind of key takeaways, because as this industry gets bigger, a lot of people are starting to go to their first conferences, and it's honestly very overwhelming when you first go, because so much is not set in stone, a lot of things are up in the air. So, the kind of thing that I wish I was able to learn from previously. What are your kind of takeaways? How would you do the conference different?

Liz26:38

Yeah, I would definitely go in with a better idea of the calendar and schedule. I feel like I was really all over the place with what I was trying to go to. I didn't anticipate the level, like some of the speakers I couldn't even get in to see because there was like such a line and such a crowd going in.

Liz27:05

And so I do wish I had kind of allotted myself more time there to be able to go in and see people speak and wait in line, because wow, like the lines to get in to hear people were crazy. And they did have TVs and stuff set up outside so that you could watch, but it was hot. It was so hot. And so being at, being outside was a little crazy, too.

Liz27:33

So I definitely would have planned that a little bit better and to see the people I wanted to see speak. I really didn't anticipate that level of crowd. And then I also would have done the event circuit a little bit differently, especially that last night. There were two other events that I had gotten emails for like right during that after-party, but it was really, really cool there, too, for like the official Bitcoin conference after-party at Oasis. And so I do wish I had gone to that other event for Audius. I thought that that sounded really cool, and I didn't make it over there.

Ty Smith27:59

Yeah, it was impossible to get to everything that you wanted to get to. It was just, and this conference more than any other, it was like so fragmented.

Liz28:08

Yeah, which is a good problem to have, honestly, but, yeah, I wish, I mean, honestly, I wish I had had just more time in general to spend at things. And Oasis got so, like it was just very loud everywhere, so I do wish there were more, I guess, intimate moments to connect with some people, especially ones that I was having like really good conversations with, but things just were moving really, really quickly, so that's just kind of how conferences in general.

Ty Smith28:37

Oasis was fun, though, especially when it started raining. It was like us and like BitBoy and TJ and all them. It was kind of funny to reconnect and have it be at like a dance party in the rain.

Liz28:50

Yeah, I saw that Twitter get posted. Michaela and Jared and I were like, 'Where did Ty go?'

Ty Smith29:02

Yeah, that night was a interesting night. Yeah, I mean, so I, yeah, I agree. It's like, I do wish it was much more clear sort of what the nightly plan was, but that's always, that's kind of always how it goes, and it really kind of depends the crowd that you're going with and, and where everyone's going. Like, there's very much a difference between like where the DeFi crowd is going, where like the influencer crowd is going, where the, you know, retail trader crowd is going. Like, it definitely requires just kind of being there and talking with everyone.

Liz29:30

Yeah.

Ty Smith29:31

I actually, opposite of what you were saying regarding the speaking events, I didn't go to a single speaker event, and I usually don't. I find that the speaker events are much more people just kind of talking to soundbites and trying to kind of grow their own, I guess, social following, rather than like providing information that like I haven't already read or, or seen on the internet.

Liz30:05

Yeah, that makes sense. I could see that.

Ty Smith30:08

Yeah, but that's just a, that's just a personal thing. I just, I think I find better use of, of the time like on networking things than, than sitting listening to people talk. I also, I mean, like buying tickets in advance is huge. You know, we bought tickets pretty far in advance, but if you didn't, you were paying like $2,000 a ticket the week leading up to it.

Ty Smith30:35

We actually already have our tickets, I don't know if I told you this, Liz, but we already bought our tickets for next year's event. Don't even know where it is yet, but...

Liz30:43

In the mystery location.

Ty Smith30:48

Yeah, we'll make it work. But yeah, I mean, I would also definitely get the whale pass next time. Like if you're someone that, especially like an entrepreneur that's trying to network with people, the whale pass is pretty sick because you get access to kind of, the tickets are super expensive, so it's like kind of like a prohibitively expensive ticket to buy.

Ty Smith31:18

But with that, you get access to people that can pay prohibitively expensive ticket prices, which for the most part are successful entrepreneurs, so you get to kind of network sort of at a higher level, which I found helpful. And you get access to other events like different after-parties and, and things like that, so I would definitely recommend doing that. If you're like part of the media or a sponsor, then usually that's included in your ticket price.

Ty Smith31:48

Another thing is the booths. So, you know, we obviously as an agency, Liz, we just do digital for the most part, but there is obviously a lot of people that spend big on events at these conferences, like booths and things like that. To find the positive ROI, I would say, is definitely not easy for every company. Like, the booths from what I've seen, like the lowest costs are $15,000 each.

Liz31:58

Wow.

Ty Smith32:01

Yeah, and that's pretty standard, I would say, but like, you can make it work. If you're an e-commerce company, it might be kind of difficult. If you're a service-based company or a software company, might be worthwhile. But that's kind of an analysis you have to do on your own.

Liz32:08

What, what booth did you see that was your favorite and that you think got like a positive ROI off of it?

Ty Smith32:18

I don't know, honestly. Hard to say, like it's hard to say behind the scenes. I think, I think Billfodl, which we discussed before, probably had a positive experience as far, because they're dealing with some kind of stiff competition, so they really have to be kind of boots on the ground to really get the market share that they need. That said, they sell a, you know, a physical product that they were selling for $80 there, it's $100 online. You got to sell a lot of product to make $15,000 back, and that's on top of the cost of getting their team there, which is based in Texas.

Ty Smith32:40

So, is that worthwhile for them? I don't know. I think they, you know, did have a long, long line and got a lot of people that at least found out about them, which might be, you know, the long-term play there. Nexo was there, you know, doing a lot of fielding of questions, which is probably worthwhile for them, because, you know, their customer lifetime value is, is so much larger than, you know, for example, like a retail e-comm company.

Liz32:51

Oh, absolutely. And they had a, they had a pretty large booth and they had the NFT gallery.

Ty Smith32:57

Yeah, and another one which we haven't even discussed about, which definitely needs to be touched on, is FTX and Blockfolio. Blockfolio, obviously, is owned by FTX, but they've been doing such a huge like, like play into sponsorship. So they did, is it Jake Paul or Logan Paul? I always, who was the, who did the boxing this weekend?

Liz33:33

Logan Paul, I think.

Ty Smith33:36

One of them.

Liz33:44

Yeah, I always have to think about that for a second. I was actually at that fight, too, but it was, it was crazy to see, I can't believe I forgot about FTX. I saw their, the new stadium, the, or I'm sorry, the arena that they named. It's, it was so insane to see that in person. I took a picture. I took a bunch of pictures.

Ty Smith34:08

Yeah, it honestly feels real to see, like I know like obviously you just pay to get that, like it's not like, you know, like the forces that be have approved crypto and now you get access to sponsoring arenas, but like just to see that in the wild is such a, I don't know, like crypto's here. Like, you know what I mean? Like everyone that goes to that arena is now asking, 'What is FTX? Oh, it's a derivatives exchange platform.' Like, it legitimizes crypto in such a significant way that I don't think people even understand yet.

Liz34:31

I mean, you think back like, you know, I'm from the DC area, we had Verizon Center, you have all these different huge places that have that role in your mind, and to be able to name an entire arena, I mean, that's crazy. That's absolutely insane.

Liz34:59

Yeah, and, and that's not like, like they're doing Barstool Sports now, which obviously wasn't at the event in Miami, but in Miami, they had the, the sound stage, which is where like, you know, the DJ was playing, was, was sponsored by Blockfolio. The after-party was sponsored by FTX. Like, they, I don't know what they spent, but they spent a ton on this event.

Liz35:27

I mean, the way that they're integrating themselves into the city of Miami is so smart, too, because their mayor right now is just so open to that and so pressed to make that work. Like, he's so invested in making that city literally the capital of capital, pulling it from New York, pulling it from LA, pulling it from San Fran. And I think that he is doing an insane and amazing job at that. It's, it's really incredible to watch, and seeing that really take place in, you know, real life as we were there was, historic, in my opinion.

Ty Smith35:50

Yeah, i mean, and Sam Bankman-Fried was walking around the event the whole time.

Liz35:57

Yeah, it's, it's wild. So, you know, I, I just, we're really living in a time of, just like the, it's the future. Like, we're living in the future. I feel like Miami was so futuristic and like tech heavy, and it really felt like there was a lot of momentum there.

Ty Smith36:42

Yeah, I agree. It, it like, there's always this sense, I feel, in crypto, especially when you're someone that like is behind the keyboard most of the day, and, you know, we, our team is mostly remote, that like you forget, you almost lose touch on, you know, how much of reality is actually reality and how much of this is just that me, I'm looking at the same thing every day.

Ty Smith37:12

And then you go to an event like the Bitcoin 2021 conference, and you see just like the passion and the power of, of dozens of thousands of people that are all also just as passionate about this and also believe in this technology and the future of money in the same way that you do, and it just solidifies it in a way that like you almost can't describe it.

Liz37:43

Oh, I have no, I mean, not that I really had any doubts or questions before, but like, if anyone needed a certain level of reassurance in crypto, I can tell you like Miami was it. If you had any questions or hesitancy, like I wouldn't anymore. It was just, it was really incredible to see, we were really at like the forefront of that technology, and the people there, the energy there, where that's going, it's just, it's so insanely powerful.

Ty Smith37:57

Yeah, definitely going to go to the next one and, and a bunch of other conferences. Hopefully, they can bring some closer to LA so we don't fly to, uh, Miami again, but super positive experience, and it's awesome to see just, you know, in person and digital marketing kind of leading the way for solidifying crypto as, you know, part of the mainstream future, um, like we saw in Miami.

Liz38:19

Yeah.

Ty Smith38:22

Yeah, so on that note, let's wrap it up. Um, if you found this episode valuable or, or interesting, uh, please remember to rate, review, and recommend us. It goes a long way in helping us know what kind of content to continue to produce. Uh, feel free to DM me on Twitter, it's @TyDanielSmith, happy to answer any questions regarding marketing, if you want to discuss anything regarding the, the Bitcoin 2021 conference. Um, and yeah, if you have any, uh, questions regarding crypto marketing in general, don't hesitate to reach out to our team at Coinbound, and that will be it for us today. Thanks, guys. Catch you on the next one.