Marketing in a Crypto Bear Market: How & Why It's Important | Ep. 39

Ty Smith0:05

Welcome to another episode of the Crypto Marketing Podcast. I'm Ty Smith, with me is Liz. Today we're going to discuss marketing in a bear market. So we'll go into why it's important to market in a crypto bear market and strategies that work well when the market is down or downtrending. So Liz, let's start off with why it's important to market in a bear market.

Ty Smith0:30

Right off the bat, I think that, and this could just be kind of a goodwill thing. The crypto space is not that big, and everyone kind of knows each other to some extent, and there's absolutely sort of this priority and level of respect given to companies that stick around when the market's down. So to me, for example, everyone that we refer business with, we've known for a long time, those relationships were built when the market was down. It's just a lot easier to get access to people, and again, I tend to personally trust people that I know are going to be here when the market goes down, and consumers think often in a very similar way.

Liz1:15

I completely agree. And I think it's time in the market, not necessarily timing of the market, especially when it comes to creating a long-term strategy, because that gives you time to build. You want to make sure that you can increase the quality of your audience during this time, and this is the perfect timing to do so.

Ty Smith1:39

Yeah, exactly. And not only that, but in a similar way, the quality of audience that sticks around, and maybe your volume as far as who you're reaching from an audience level goes down, but the quality of those people that you're going to be reaching when the market is down is just significantly higher. You totally cut out all those the paper hands crowd that's just here to get in on the latest trend and doesn't actually care about crypto and is going to leave when price starts downtrending.

Liz2:12

Exactly.

Ty Smith2:13

So you get a much more quality group of people that are so much more involved with your brand, will be long-term users, things like that.

Liz2:23

Well, and they're going to be your biggest brand ambassadors. They're going to be people, word of mouth is the strongest form of marketing, but it takes time to foster that. It does not happen overnight. And you have to invest during a downturn is the best time to invest because you can create an ecosystem that fosters that. But you have to do that in a long span of time. Things like SEO, content creation, building relationships with influencers, testing content, that all takes time. And so if you can do that and really ramp that back up when another bull run hits, you're going to be positioned to really take over, and people are going to be almost evangelical when it comes to that because they want to secure their investment. They want to make sure what they've put their time into, too, shows a return.

Ty Smith3:23

Yeah, and I mean everyone that, this is not our first bull run by any means. We were here, Coinbound was actually born in kind of a pretty vicious bear market environment. But everyone that really found a ton of success in this most recent bull run, they didn't just hop on crypto because it was getting hot. They were here building and planting the seeds for the past several years when no one was really paying attention. And back on the point of building trust and kind of getting really more ingrained with the community, that stuff goes a long way. I think of BitBoy Crypto is a perfect example. He started his channel when it was after the 2017 bull run. So things had really cooled off around the time that he started his channel, and for a long period of time he was putting out really good content, it's just there was not a whole lot of people paying attention at the time. But he really, I guess, long-term believed in the space and continued to plug away, and he's the number one crypto YouTuber now. I mean, he just passed 1.1 or 1.2 million subscribers, making him number one, and he deserves all the success that he's currently getting because he was here. He was plugging away when no one else was.

Liz4:39

Exactly. And he'll probably hit, too, for the next bull run. And then all you have to do is look at the charts. I mean, it's the most obvious thing you can look at. We're still up, I don't know, I think 200% in Bitcoin alone. It's crazy. So, I mean, even though the market is down-turned right now, it's time to build. This is the perfect time to build and establish your presence, establish your audience, test content, and really build your SEO out, and make sure that you're fostering a community that's going to really shout your name when the bull market comes up again.

Ty Smith5:16

Yeah, and on the topic of investing now, from an ROI perspective of marketing in a crypto bull run versus a crypto bearish or at least less hot market, it's a lot easier to turn a positive ROI now, when the market's down. There's just so much less noise. All these media companies are not being hit up hundreds of times a day. Pricing becomes a little bit more realistic. Influencer pricing becomes more realistic. Agency pricing becomes more realistic.

Liz5:45

People are easier to reach.

Ty Smith5:47

Exactly. Exactly. Yeah, once once the market cools off and people don't feel like they're going to invest 10k in marketing and get 20 million in investment, pricing becomes more normalized. So you can take advantage of that now.

Liz6:03

Yeah, and influencers themselves, they want to make sure that they can get also a consistent paycheck. So they're going to want to work with people who are around all the time, not just when things are good. And so when you go and call them and ask, 'Hey, we'd love to work with you,' they're going to answer the phone first for the people who have been around and stuck around.

Ty Smith6:25

Exactly. Yeah, so on the topic, you touched on it a little bit, Liz, about strategies that work well and that we would recommend during a downturn. You touched on SEO, which I would put under the umbrella of content in many cases. I think just content in general is something that people should be investing in when the market's down. Back to the point of there being less noise, not only less noise as far as the media channels being kind of clogged up with interest and just consumers being bombarded with advertising for crypto stuff, but content production slows down significantly. So if you're out there creating resources and content, whether it's newsletters, blog posts, podcasts, whatever it is, you'll get through a lot more easily when the market's not crazy noisy.

Liz7:13

I totally agree, because during that time, you're not just putting out content. That content feeds back to a goal of creating authority in the space. And so if you're building over time, that's going to really help you out because you're going to have tons and tons of resources, tons of videos for people to look back to and see how people operated through fluctuations and how to maneuver through that. Because you have to realize right now, too, a lot of people who are freaking out a bit more, they're newer people. They're newcomers to the space. And we have to help them get through that, too. We have to give them a hope that, hey, these are cycles, it's going to fluctuate, but look back at who's been in the space and who's stayed in the space, and they have insane authority. They've built content over time. They've built their SEO presence. They've built their Twitter profiles. They've positioned their leadership teams in ways that also makes them as individuals authorities in the space. And so when newcomers come in, even for the next cycle and the next cycle after that, they're going to start to look back and see, 'Hey, who can I look to?' And you want to be that person or that company that people look to. And I think that establishing that authority, especially when no one is looking, is so strategic.

Ty Smith8:38

Exactly. Yeah, back to that, the farming analogy, right now is definitely the time to be planting the seeds that you're going to harvest in the next bull run. Because there's going to be another bull run. It's not like crypto's going to go anywhere, despite what mainstream media might say at times with crypto's dead, and they'll they'll continue to say things like that.

Liz8:56

Well, and just look at the amount that people are putting towards sponsorships and brand deals and spreading their name. Look at FTX's presence in Miami. Look at what NYDIG and Q2 are working on. I mean, massive adoption is on its way. It may not be as loud, but it's happening. And if you're not participating right now and you're just looking to get in when the market is hot again, it's going to be really difficult, especially for the next one. I mean, look at how mainstream it got just even over the last year and a half, two years. We're looking at 10, 20x that next time.

Ty Smith9:38

Yeah, I agree. All right, I think we I think we touched on basically everything regarding marketing in a bear market. So we'll wrap this up. If you guys found this podcast episode valuable, shoot me a DM or email. I'd love to hear what you guys like and don't like so we can continue to create content like that. Also, be sure to rate, review, and recommend us. That will be it. Thanks, guys.

Liz10:04

Thanks, everyone.