Top Chat Channels Crypto Companies Should Have | Ep. 22

Ty Smith0:04

Welcome to another episode of the Crypto Marketing Show. My name is Ty Daniel Smith and with me is TJ and Kylie, and today we are discussing the top chat channels cryptocurrency companies and content creators should be using. So we will talk about why you need messaging channels and which chatting apps you should be using. So let's start off with why you need chat channels. What is the importance of them?

TJ0:20

Yeah, this was a big topic of discussion that we had when we were trying to get things sorted out because, I mean, for us, basically a chat channel is a way to manage a group or a community. If you're a brand or whatever you're using your chat channel for, it can be a variety of different things. But for us, we just found ourselves constantly in multiple different DMs across all these different social media platforms, and so-and-so is talking to this person individually, and so-and-so is talking to that person individually. We needed a place where we could kind of pull all of these conversations and discussions all together in one place and make it easier for people to talk directly, people to talk collaboratively. And it was a big back-and-forth on which one we make our primary one. Like you said, we use, obviously, Slack a lot, we use Telegram a lot. Those two are, I mean, Telegram is probably kind of like the go-to crypto chat community thing. But yeah, as far as why we use them, I would say managing conversations and discussions within a group or community.

Ty Smith1:26

Yeah, and definitely if you're a brand, you need to share updates and news, stuff like that. So having everyone in one place allows you to engage with them directly, as well as casually and constantly.

TJ1:33

And quickly. Basically, to communicate a message quickly to a large group of people.

Ty Smith1:36

Yeah, and just, I mean, in general, no brand is out there is going to say not talking to people is beneficial.

TJ1:39

Right. Communication is, yeah, a huge part of the job.

Ty Smith1:40

Yeah, especially in a B2B agency like us. So the top three channels that we recommend for content creators and brands in the crypto space are, Telegram is the first one. Let's go one by one. So Telegram is probably, I would call like the de facto messaging app of crypto. It seems like everyone is, everyone in crypto is on Telegram, and they even had an ICO.

TJ2:22

Yeah, well, it's basically, for those of you who don't know, it's similar to a WhatsApp but has a lot of other different built-in features, a lot more privacy functions. And it is very clean and quick and fast and has desktop application. Still no spell check on that desktop application, though. That's one little feature request.

Ty Smith2:33

Yeah, I mean, they raised $1.7 billion through their ICO, so maybe they can get on that.

TJ2:35

Yeah, that shouldn't really be that hard to fix. Come on, guys.

Ty Smith2:37

They had the, how do you pronounce it, TON or TON is their token name, their ticker, whatever.

TJ2:41

Okay.

Ty Smith2:42

Yeah, I like that you can have, it's really, really seamless across mobile and desktop or web. I find that super useful. And I like the saved messages feature. So like rather than share a Google Drive link, I could just message myself something and then get on my computer if I have something say on my phone.

TJ3:19

Yeah, and it's actually great the way that you can, it stacks links that have been shared, stacks files that have been shared in conversations. The searchability within Telegram is pretty cool, too.

Ty Smith3:25

Yeah, I would say it's better for a lot of direct messaging and small groups. At large scale, it gets a little cluttered, which is why we, we originally were all about Telegram and then we transitioned sort of over to Slack, which, which I guess we should talk about as well. So Slack is organized into what Slack calls workspaces. So that's basically just chat rooms, I guess.

TJ3:40

Mhm.

Ty Smith3:41

So we have all different kinds of channels in our workspace, and each one has a specific purpose. So we have a public one that everyone joins automatically. We have groups for the influencers that we work with. We have channels that are specific to different campaigns that we're working on so we can discuss deliverables with clients, as well as reports and things like that. And then, of course, we have our internal chats that are just for communicating within Coinbound. And we have crypto marketing. So if you have any questions about crypto marketing, we have a channel for that and you can ask questions and we're always in there talking about that. So if you want to join that, just go to coinbound.io/joinslack. So that's a nice little plug there.

TJ4:33

Yeah, and the main reason we kind of moved towards Slack over Telegram as our primary is because, as he was saying, it starts, when you start to try to scale up Telegram, it gets crazy when you're trying to manage a whole bunch of group conversations. Things get lost pretty fast, where Slack gave us the opportunity to have channels, as well as DM groups, and then some other stuff that we haven't even really started digging into and working with yet, as they've got stuff called like breakouts or like...

Ty Smith4:50

I haven't explored that yet. I don't know what that is.

TJ5:16

Yeah, you can have like little meetings and different stuff, and I forget what they call it, but we haven't even really dug into that.

Ty Smith5:19

Both are, both are definitely vital.

TJ5:20

Oh, yeah, they're huge.

Ty Smith5:21

Yeah, they also have a lot of third-party integrations. So it integrates with HubSpot and Trello and Zapier and If This Then That. So you can build a lot of cool automations in there. For example, we have a channel for the podcast. So automatically, as soon as this podcast goes out, it will pull from our RSS feed, see the update, and post it to a channel.

TJ5:33

And the same, it syncs to the chatbot on the website. That pulls right into Slack.

Ty Smith5:35

Yeah, exactly. So if someone messages our chatbot on the website, it will send me a notification in Slack, or anyone else who's on that chatbot.

Kylie5:40

I have, I have one problem with Slack.

Ty Smith5:42

Let's hear it.

Kylie5:42

No GIFs. There are no GIFs. You cannot send GIFs, and it is a travesty. Slack, please, we are begging you, add GIFs.

TJ5:48

Yeah, I am 100% on board with that. That's my number one complaint. Once you get used to using Telegram and then you go to try to express yourself emotionally on Slack, you're going to find it very limiting.

Kylie5:53

Yeah, some things just don't need an actual response. I just need some cute little animation to send.

Ty Smith6:22

Yeah, you can do emojis, though, which is cool.

TJ6:24

Yeah, that's what I'm saying, but sometimes emojis don't cut it. Like you go to, you go to express yourself and you realize, oh, I only have emojis to work with, and then it's tough.

Ty Smith6:28

Yeah. So the next one is very similar to Slack, and that's Discord.

TJ6:30

Yeah, actually, the way I always describe Slack is I say Slack is if you put Telegram and Discord together, Slack is kind of like the hybrid, the in-between.

Ty Smith6:36

Yeah, so, so every ICO back in like pre-2017 had a Slack channel. That was like the way everyone managed their community. And then there was some, there was some vulnerability that you could see the email addresses of people because that's how you sign into Slack. I believe that's patched, but still, the damage was kind of done and everyone migrated towards Discord for managing community managers.

TJ6:49

Yeah, or a lot of like trading groups and mining groups, I know, have very active Discords. Discord came up from the gaming community, so a lot of people with that kind of background tend to gravitate towards Discord. And it is really, really cool as far as the different applications and it has a lot of different automations and community members and managers and different things.

Ty Smith7:28

Different like administrator roles you can assign. Yeah, that's really cool. So if you have people that are managing your, who are moderating your community, you can give them special permissions. I don't think you can do that in Slack. You can't do that on, you can do it on Telegram a little bit, but not so, not so well. So it's laid out very similar to Slack in terms of there being channels that could be kind of purpose-built. But it still doesn't have the third-party integrations of Slack.

TJ7:43

Oh, and this is a big piece we forgot to mention on both Slack and Discord that Telegram doesn't have is voice, voice communication. Discord, that's where their big is, like they're, it's a chat room, audio chat room where you talk with everybody back and forth in real time.

Ty Smith7:55

You can do that on Telegram. You can send voice messages.

TJ7:56

Well, I guess you, yeah, you can send voice messages, but I'm talking about more like direct. So like Discord, that's where their big is, like they're, it's a chat room, audio chat room where you talk with everybody back and forth in real time. And you can do that on Slack as well, not on the free version, but on the upgraded version. You know, like have a group meeting, you go audio live with everybody in the chat channel and you're all talking and discussing something in real time. And both of, that exists both on Discord and Slack, that doesn't exist on Telegram.

Kylie8:32

That is super cool.

TJ8:33

Yeah.

Ty Smith8:34

Yeah. All right, so that is all for today. If you're looking to start a community online, be sure to check out Slack, Telegram, and Discord. And remember to rate, review, and recommend this podcast. Those reviews really go a long way in terms of helping us grow and put out more content like this.

TJ8:44

We need you.

Ty Smith8:45

We need you. And join us on Slack, obviously. Oh, I should have put our, our Telegrams as well, but there, we like Slack.

TJ8:49

Yeah, Slack is the one we're plugging. I'm @youngdumbcrypto on Telegram if you want to find me.

Ty Smith8:52

Okay.

TJ8:53

And everywhere else.

Ty Smith8:53

Yeah. So join us on Slack at coinbound.io/joinslack. We are talking about all kinds of marketing-related things there. And follow us on Twitter @coinbound_io, Ty Daniel Smith, Crypto Kylie, and Young Dumb Crypto. That is all for today. Thanks, guys.

TJ9:03

See you next time.