Creator: “What Types of NFTs Should I Create? In What Order? How Many? And How Should I Price Them? Help!”
An attempt to explain the best strategy to introduce tokens to your community.
Photo by Rodion Kutsaev on Unsplash
Periodically, creators in our community ask me about my NFT strategy and how in just 4 months, I created and sold out 250 NFTs to my community.
If you’re a podcaster jumping into the NFT space, here are my recommendations for five tokens you should create, plus the order in which you should create them.
Step 1: NFTs for Your Core Fans
Do this: Cater to your core fans first. For your true fans, create a Password Protected 1st Token.
Recommendations:
Small number.
Reasonable Price.
Great value.
Unique utilities.
The upshot: This is a unique way to do something that’s largely missing in the podcasting world—identifying your show’s actual true fans. For years, podcasters have been able to view their download stats. However, downloads ≠ listens ≠ fans. Do you know what percentage of your auto-download episodes are actually listened to? How many of your listeners are true fans?
Why this is cool: By creating a password protected NFT for your episodes, you can give your listeners an opportunity to prove that they’re listening to your show and care about it. In return, you give them an NFT that’s free, or an NFT that’s purchasable for a low price, and that NFT provides them unique access to you and your community. If you do this, you won’t just have anonymous download stats, you will have names and emails of listeners who have claimed your NFT. That way you’ll be able to communicate with them directly through your Uncut.FM NFT-gated space.
Uncut.FM example: Digital futurist Brian Fanzo does a great job of this with his “NFT 365 Podcast” and #Mint365 NFT collection He gives NFTs and special rewards to listeners who claim the “proof of listenership” token.
Step 2: NFTs for Your Other Fans
Do this: Serve your other fans second. For every fan who isn’t a core fan, create a General Membership Token.
Recommendations:
Larger number.
Small price.
Basic value.
Basic utilities.
The upshot: Your membership token should have a larger number and still be a very attainable price. This is a token that you want most of your fans to acquire. Because this token is available to most people, the utility or value behind the token is more general, but can give your token holders access to more exclusive opportunities. For instance, this token might also be required to access future token drops.
Why this is cool: It’s highly likely that your listeners are probably scattered all around the world, all disconnected from each other. Creating an awesome digital membership card for all of your fans is a big step forward in materializing your community of listeners. Creating this kind of NFT gets to the heart of an ownership economy where you get to design, own, and share whatever you want with your community members.
Uncut.FM example: Joel Comm and Travis Wright are doing a great job with their “Bad Crypto Podcast.” They released a low priced community token, called “The Bad Crypto Nifty Club,” for around $3. Soon, they’ll be releasing higher priced NFTs along with future episodes. Importantly, to purchase those more exclusive NFTs, listeners will need to already have the membership token.
Step 3: NFTs for Each Episode
Do this: After you have a generalized token for your community, start creating NFTs for each episode you publish.
Recommendations:
Small number.
Reasonable price.
Average value.
Unique utilities.
The upshot: With this strategy, you want to have a lower number of NFTs available, but have them at a slightly higher price. Minting each episode or special content you create as NFTs, can give collectors an opportunity to give a golden bookmark to their favorite episodes and access special content from you.
Why this is cool: We know you’ve listened to a lot of podcast episodes that have influenced—or maybe even transformed—your life. What if every time an episode really impacted your life, you bought an NFT supporting the creator and bookmarking that moment? With this strategy, you can give NFT holders co-ownership of your content and even make them the “guardians” of that content. With Uncut.FM each minted episode is automatically stored on Arweave and remains available to the public eternally.
Uncut.FM example: Check out the Silicon Carne NFT community to see this approach in action.
Step 4: NFTs for Special Moments
Do this: Create special unique tokens to celebrate special moments or deliver special values.
Recommendations:
Small number.
High price.
Various values.
Rare utilities.
The upshot: Another step in your NFT journey for your podcast could be highlighting some of the special moments in your podcast journey. These moments will be known by your super fans who will want to support your journey, participate in your inside jokes, and be co-owners of your significant moments.
Why this is cool: Very few podcasts hit the “top downloads” charts if they cater to all types of listeners. Realistically, you’ve got a much greater chance at becoming prosperous and profitable if you create shows that are for a defined subset of people. And that’s what these NFTs celebrate—your inner circle. Like subcultural artifacts that distinguish insiders from outsiders, these NFTs create bonding moments with your fans. It’s okay that outsiders won’t understand. Ignore them. Play to your core fans in your podcasts and in your NFTs, and you’ll start embracing a workable definition of success.
Uncut.FM example: Tanner Campbell is doing this well with his show “Good Morning, Podcasters!” Each month, he’s minting a unique NFT that highlights one of his most talked about or most passionate stories (or rants). Last month, he minted a cool NFT, “The Email Thief,” that spotlights a podcasting company that uses questionable marketing practices.
Step 5: DAOs and NFTs for Sharing the Spoils
Do this: Next, introduce NFTs where owners get a percentage of future profits or voting rights on future profits.
Recommendations:
Small number.
High price.
Great value.
Shared revenue.
The upshot: Some people think DAOs, profit-sharing NFTs, and NFTs that come with voting rights are a pipe dream. Not me. I think they capture the underlying vision of audiences. Along the way, they transform communities and into decentralized organizations that make decisions in a bottoms-up management approach.
Why this is cool: These NFTs help us rethink how podcasters should make money. In short, they show us that we stop making money from our fans, and we can start making money with them. I’m so committed to this model that I’m sharing 25% of my 2022-23 NFT sales directly with my Founding Member Token holders, 10% goes into a Charity Wallet and 30% into a Community Wallet. At the end of the season, Founding Members and I will decide how to use the money collected in the Charity Wallet. Other NFT Holders will get to choose with me how to use the money in the Community Wallet (1 NFT = 1 vote).
Future example: For my next season of “Silicon Carne,” I’m going to create three tiers of Founding Member Tokens. Here’s my revenue split with my community:
Another future example: Seth Silvers will be rolling this feature out with his podcast, “The Business.” The owners of his gold card (coming out this Fall) will have voting rights in The Business Treasury, which will be where 50% of all podcast profits will go. Each quarter, NFT holders will vote on what businesses and organizations get awarded grants.
Potential violations of securities law?
The SEC hasn’t yet clarified their stance on NFTs and cryptocurrency. We know that our use case above can get complicated when we consider securities laws. We believe there’ll be more use cases similar to this in the future that explore this area. In the meantime, rest assured that we’re working with experts to bring you the best advice.
Thanks For Reading!
What did you think of my five steps that correspond to five tokens? Did I miss something? Would you recommend a different order? Let me know!
P.S. Here’s a helpful summary of the five steps I’ve outlined in this article.
Learn more at Uncut.FM and don’t forget to join the conversation on our Discord and on Twitter.