Believe it or not, the rise of the Non-Fungible Tokens gave birth to a new type of marketing – NFT marketing. And in some aspects, it’s nothing new, yet in others, it’s something completely different.
Think of it like this: from an outside perspective, NFTs look like nothing but a bubble with hyperinflated prices. Most of them have no intrinsic value and no real utility.
Yet, that’s the case for many products in the mainstream markets, not just artwork.
However, in a free market, value is determined by supply and demand, which makes the whole economy run efficiently.
And like in most products, a carefully crafted strategy, brand identity, and communication can gather an entire community around an NFT collection, which will start putting value to it.
An NFT is a cryptocurrency token unique in value that is not interchangeable with any other NFT, even if it belongs to the same collection.
In essence, NFTs are unique assets that can consist of works of art, ownership titles, and of course, collectibles. But the true value of non-fungible tokens comes from the ability to store the data regarding ownership over an asset, so their potential goes far beyond a picture on a blockchain. In the online games’ world, it’s not rare for a game to close down, reset, or make a change leading to users losing their hard-earned (sometimes even bought) items. And problems as such can be easily prevented through NFTs.
But aside from games, Decentraland has shown the crypto world that real estate can be tokenized just as well. Yes, Decentraland is a virtual world, but it is only a matter of time before some clever real estate developers and agents will realize they can create NFTs for the property they’re selling. And thanks to how much smart contracts have evolved, you can even include in them the data from the purchasing contract.
Speaking of smart contracts; although in the beginning, Ethereum’s ERC721 token standard was the main type of smart contract used in creating NFTs, now more and more networks support their creation and the transaction. Some of the most popular alternatives are Solana, Polygon, and Crypto.com.
Top 5 NFT Marketplace Platforms
The creation and distribution of the NFT collection are more straightforward than ever, thanks to the NFT marketplace platforms.
Not only can you get right to selling your NFTs from the start, but many marketplaces even allow lazy minting. That means that you don’t have to write a single line of code but simply upload your NFTs and pay the transaction fees (minting included) the first time you sell them.
However, although the most popular platforms have the most traffic and activity, not all of them may suit your plan. So, it’s important to check which one of those hot marketplaces best suits your project’s needs.
OpenSea is the leading NFT marketplace offering a listing of over 20 million assets. Besides art NFTs, OpenSea offers a wide variety of utility, VR, and music NFTs, even domain names.
From Bored Apes to Decentraland parcels, almost any NFT is available there.
The platform currently integrates 3 chains: Ethereum, Polygon, and Klaytn.
However, you can only lazy mint collections on Ethereum and Polygon.
Connecting to OpenSea is quite user-friendly as well. There isn’t a complex sign-up process but a simple connection with your wallet to read the token attribution. There are 13 wallets supported, including Metamask, Coinbase Wallet, Wallet Connect, and Fortmatic.
At base, Crypto.com is a payment, trading, and financial services company that offers a cryptocurrency trading mobile app and web application built on top of its own decentralized, open-source blockchain.
The platform has grown exponentially and now is one of the top competitors in the market, even as an NFT marketplace.
The Crypto.com DeFi Wallet supports Crypto.org Chain NFTs on the Crypto.org Chain, as well as ERC721 and ERC1155 NFTs on the Ethereum network.
However, the Crypto.com NFT platform is quite exclusive. First, you have to create a dedicated account, verify your identity, then submit an application.
After the application, if you become an approved creator, you’ll be notified by email. Yet, Crypto.com does not guarantee a response to your application, as they will only respond to successful candidates.
Axie Marketplace is the platform where players and investors buy/sell any NFT related to the Axie Infinity video game.
The game, as well as the NFT marketplace, runs on Ethereum. And although Axie Infinity is an account-based platform, access to the Axie Infinity Marketplace is also facilitated through other applications and platforms, such as MetaMask and Binance.
The NFTs do have certain utility in the game, making them easier to sell, yet you can’t just go on the Axie Marketplace and decide to sell your own personalized collection. The whole marketplace is centered around the game, so customization goes as far as the environment’s parameters allow.
KnownOrigin is one of the fastest-growing Ethereum NFT marketplaces out there. You can simply connect to the platform through one of the wallet browser extensions accepted by the website.
Currently, the most recommended option is MetaMask.
It’s important to notice that KnownOrigin is an art-focused NFT marketplace, so you can start buying NFTs as soon as you connect your wallet to the platform.
Yet selling is a bit more complicated.
To upload and sell NFTs there, you have to create an artist account. To do that, after creating a profile and verifying your social media, you must submit an Artist account application in order to get your account enabled.
Once enabled, you can upload and sell art without a problem in the primary market. Also, it’s important to keep in mind that KnownOrigin requires that the art be your own, and you mustn’t upload it on any other marketplace.
SupeRare is another Ethereum digital art marketplace where artists can sell their collections.
The platform integrates with the Metamask, Fortmatic, and Wallet Connect extensions, yet you have to create an account associated with the wallet address manually.
Also, you must submit an artist profile before you can upload and sell NFTs.
And like KnownOrigin, SuperRare also requires you not to upload your art on other marketplaces.
Key takeaways
A Non-Fungible Token is a cryptocurrency token that is not fungible. That means that the token is unique in value and is not interchangeable with any other NFT, even if it belongs to the same collection.
Some of the most notorious NFT marketplaces are OpenSea, Crypto.com, Axie Marketplace, KnownOrigin, SuperRare.
In order to succeed with your NFT project, you should choose the right NFT platform, create a profile and a brand, structure your collection wisely, raise the floor price, and ultimately draw in your audience.
To effectively draw in your audience, you can use airdrops to stir up activity, use influencer marketing, employ social media communication & community building tactics, launch advertising campaigns, publish guest articles, and set up your SEO.
