I often see Hiveans say that marketing and advertising doesn't work and that [insert problem here] meant that marketing and advertising Hive isn't worth it.
Well this is utter BS!
And I have the evidence to prove it - In Court!
@jerrybanfield conducted a very successful paid advertising campaign promoting Steem:
- on Facebook from June 2017 to 29 Jan 2018; and
- on Google (incl YouTube) from June 2017 to April 2018.
Have a look at the numbers!
Notice that every single measure peaks on the 29 Jan 2018 - the day before Facebook banned all Crypto Ads.
This is a key piece of evidence in the Crypto Class Action with @jpbliberty.
Here is a small extract from my Statement of Claim in the Crypto Class Action
During the period 2 June 2017 until late April 2018, an extensive crowdfunded campaign of promoting the Steem blockchain and STEEM cryptocurrency using paid advertising on the Facebook, Google search and YouTube platforms was conducted by a highly experienced digital marketing professional called Jerry Banfield (“Banfield Campaign”). It was supported financially and operationally by large numbers of Steem blockchain users.
Jerry Banfield intended to continue and expand the Banfield Campaign in 2018, but was prevented from doing so by the Respondents contravening conduct.
During the period from 2 June 2017 to 29 January 2018 the Steem blockchain and Steemit social media website experienced very rapid growth on relevant measures of social media success, website popularity and the STEEM price:
i) the number of weekly new users rose 18 fold to a record high;
ii) the number of weekly posts rose 9.4 fold to a record high;
iii) the number of weekly comments rose 6.7 fold to a record high;
iv) the number of monthly active users rose 9.7 fold to a record high;
v) the Alexa ranking of the Steemit.com website (global popularity by website traffic) rose from #3221 to #1156
vi) Steemit.com’s record high Alexa ranking of #932 was achieved almost 6 weeks later on 10 March 2018, which is consistent with an actual peak in website traffic around 29 January 2018, as Alexa measures website traffic over a 3 month period);
vii) the price of STEEM rose 6.75 fold to US$6.14;
viii) a record high 20,898 new users in a single day was set on 29 Jan 2018The Banfield Campaign was a significant contributor to the growth of Steem during the period from 2 June 2017 to 29 January 2018.
Advertising on the Respondents’ platforms is highly effective when targeted by experienced professionals. Promotion of Steem on Facebook was particularly effective in attracting users of the Facebook social media network to try the Steemit social media network.
The Banfield Campaign ceased paid advertising on Facebook at the end of January 2018 due to the Facebook First Ad Ban Announcement and the implementation of the Facebook First Ad Ban Policy.
The Banfield Campaign’s last promoted post was dated 17 April 2018 and it ceased paid advertising on Google (search and YouTube) shortly thereafter due to the Google Ad Ban Announcement and the implementation of the Google Ad Ban Policy.
During the period from 30 January 2018 until the end of 2018 the Steem blockchain and Steemit social media website experienced severe decline on relevant measures of social media success, website popularity and the STEEM price:
i) the number of weekly new users fell 59 fold;
ii) the number of weekly posts fell 5.6 fold;
iii) the number of weekly comments fell 4.2 fold;
iv) the number of monthly active users fell 2.4 fold;
v) the Alexa ranking fell from its 10 March 2018 peak of #932 to #2988;
vi) the STEEM price fell 21 fold.
Of course advertising and marketing work and are needed for Hive, no doubt. Otherwise Apple and Redbull and many other big companies wouldn't use it. Now, I don't particularly like Jerry Banfield but he's had a strategy and that's what Hive needs. Strategies and customer targets. The product works pretty fine and just needs to be sold.
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I commend you for putting together these numbers, even if some do not appreciate the time it took you to gather the information.
Quality content, as my 100% vote indicates, at least as far as I'm concerned. From the votes given to this short informational article (I know who auto-votes and who manually vote) I am not alone in my positive opinion of your post though I do not agree with all of the conclusions. Lots of good information overall.
Thanks.
I put the info together by painstakingly going through @penguinpablo Steem Stats posts from 2-3 years ago.
Boy was tedious scrolling back all that way.
I did it for the Crypto Class Action but felt it important to share with everyone on Hive.
check out my replies across this post
Isn't this a classic case of assuming: correlation implies causation?
There is no consensus to suggest that Facebook's ban is the cause of the entire market crashing 80%+. In fact the entire pump/dump that occurred was well within the limits of appearing exactly the same as those that came before it.
That being said of course advertising is important and Facebook's shenanigans clearly had at least some negative effect on the market. How much is hard to say.
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My science brain is with you, but (and I'm really enjoying learning this as I go along with Andrew) the legal precedents are quite happy with correlations and unproven causation.
The exact level of evidence we need to show that Facebook and Google's actions COULD have had a massive effect on many crypto projects (not just Steem) seems to be way in excess of what has been there for other cases that succeeded.
The other component to this is that the drops after the ad ban were the largest in Bitcoin and ETH's histories. Way outside 4 standard deviations of typical drops. That's good enough evidence for this being an unusual event.
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Causation is simple.
Advertising stimulates demand and provides economic benefit that exceeds its costs. This is why Facebook & Google have trillion dollar businesses.
Crypto prices are a pure function of supply and demand. Supply is fixed. Thus price is directly controlled by demand which is increased by advertising.
Banning Ads lowers demand that lowers price. Economics 101.
The data shows not just one but at least 4 separated correlations between introduction of ad bans and very statistically unusual drops in crypto prices and also in social media metrics such as user acquisition and engagement.
The chances of this being unrelated are very small.
In a civil case we only need to prove on the balance of probabilities (50.1%) that the ad ban caused "some negative effect on the market".
Then we only need to prove some possibility (5%) that crypto growth would have continued to have that possibility taken into account in quantum of damages calculations.
If there is a 10% chance that Steem would have kept rising 6.75 times every 7 months for a further 7 months after 29 Jan 2018 then the Steem price used for damages calculations will be over $10.
As a marketer I know ads can work, that's a given but its how effective they can be, the sign up process is awful, the sites would need to be tagged up correctly to build funnels or you're just pissing money away. I personally wouldn't be spending money on user acquisition when my sign up process is so terrible, fix that, see what that organic uplift is then, then we can make a case for advertising.
I've run many a ad campaign on Facebook, Twitter, Google, Pinterest and they can all drive traffic, its all about frequency, targeting and getting the right messaging to push them into your funnel.
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Thanks for noticing yes the ads for Steem blew it up just like they did when I ran them for Dash earlier in 2017!
Coke uses plenty of hype and advertising and so does Facebook and Google and any other successful business.
Are they bubbles?
If crypto or Steem or Hive were just a bubble they wouldn't be still going 2.5 years later.
Saying it was a bubble and it would have popped regardless is an unprovable and statement with no basis.
Its like shooting someone dead and saying they probably would have died soon anyway, even though they were young in fine health and growing quickly.
seriously? everyone who drinks coke doesn't drink anything else. customers for life. they need no ads to keep consuming
You are missing the point entirely.
People are leaving all social media networks and businesses all the time. Its called "churn".
If the number of new users > churn then there is growth.
If the number of new users < churn then there is decline.
Advertising brings in new users.
Its also pretty funny someone posting on a blockchain using a computer saying "Numbers don't mean shit."
Both computers, blockchains and social media networks are ALL about the numbers.
And just to demonstrate I've given your comment a downvote rather than an upvote for profanity and stupidity.
Still sure numbers don't matter?
they brought in people. they didn't stay because steem was a piece of shit for small users back then. rewards were 99.99% directed by whales from whales to whales. this is not the case at hive now. retention is a lot more likely to work. but some people could certainly help in the user retention category if there was, i.e., a compilation of people who reward engagement. this way, even non-authors users would have a reason to stay for rewards
This is crystal clear to anybody who is an active author. We pick a community, write good posts and engage, we get rewarded. This was not the case before the increase of curation rewards to 50% and the creation of communities. Even I am myself one of those who are a lot more willing to upvote others instead of trying to self-upvote as much as possible.
A lot of us are happy in constantly getting $0.50+ for our efforts, because we used to get no more than $0 unless we were lucky enough to get upvoted by one of the few major curators of yore. Sure, $0.50 might not be good to you, but it helps most of us. This is something we constantly get now, as long as we can find a spot under the shade, which is not hard to do.
Actually the numbers show the opposite of a mass exodus.
Even though new users dropped very rapidly after the ad ban and in Dec '18 was 1/3rd of what it was in May '17, monthly active users declined much more slowly and was still 4 times its May '17 level in Dec '18.
The numbers prove you wrong again!
Comparing Facebook to non-mainstream websites is not relevant...
Then I must have missed something.