Content marketing in crypto winter—5 bear market strategies

TL;DR

• Crypto winter is creating a valuable content marketing opportunity
• Crypto and web3 businesses can focus on high-impact content marketing strategies
• Crypto content marketing is crucial to educate and drive adoption of blockchain

Does it feel chilly in here? Crypto winter is upon us (again) and creating hardships for crypto and web3 businesses everywhere. Crypto content marketing budgets are getting slashed and creative disruption is happening—meaning that value is emerging in surprising ways.

Crypto and web3 companies can harness the benefits of content marketing in any economy, although fewer do when coin prices are low. Don’t be that blockchain company! 😆 Instead, keep reading to get your head around five smart strategies to market your blockchain company in a bearish economy.

1. Use affordable website traffic to raise awareness

Are you seeking to raise brand awareness? Boosting traffic to your website is a tactic that content marketers frequently use to introduce more people to your company. Generating website traffic can get expensive, but may be more affordable with less competition in down economies.

Website traffic can come from many sources, with paid advertising and organic search results being major drivers of traffic for most companies. Unfavorable market conditions sometimes make website traffic easier to procure and more affordable. Why? Let’s take a look—

• Paid advertising: Crypto, web3, and fintech companies can pay Google, LinkedIn, Twitter, and other platforms to rank their content at the top of the search results—and some of these companies can pay for ads. Every keyword imaginable has its own cost per click (CPC), with the keywords having the most search volume—like “best crypto exchange”—being the most expensive. When companies slash their ad budgets, and stop competing for keywords, CPC declines accordingly.
• Organic search traffic: Organic search results are the keyword results that Google shows for free, below any paid advertising. Blockchain and fintech companies can rank well in organic search results by dedicating resources to producing exceptional content that meets its target audiences’ needs—and can potentially rank more quickly in weak economies. Decreased competition can make it easier to get—and maintain—a top spot in Google search.

2. Prioritize low-cost tactics to drive engagement

Content supports community, and community building is key to the success of many crypto projects. Web3 and crypto companies can use their limited marketing budgets to build thriving communities by focusing on low-cost, high-impact tactics—for content production, distribution, and engagement.

Let’s take a look at some specific tactics that crypto content marketers use to boost community engagement without breaking the (DeFi) bank—

• Focus on social media: Blockchain and fintech companies can find their target audiences on a variety of social media platforms. The casual atmosphere and ability to engage organically at low or no cost makes social media a popular choice for cost-conscious marketers.
• Target the most relevant channels: With so many social media platforms from which to choose, savvy content marketers focus on the platforms most appealing to their audiences. Establishing presences on only the most relevant social channels is another way to maximize impact while keeping a limited budget in check.
• Repurpose content for different audiences: Content marketers can stretch tight budgets by repurposing content in new ways. Repurposing anchor content for different audiences and platforms is a cost-efficient strategy to maximize community engagement.
• Promote interactive content: Even a really great blog isn’t usually very interactive. Content marketers with a goal of community building can create many types of interactive content—such as contests, giveaways, raffles, and surveys—to increase engagement. Interactive content can engage and entertain without costing very much.

3. Fill your competitors’ content gaps

Spending money on content marketing during a crypto winter may feel risky. Content marketing may seem like a luxury—or, that’s what your competitors are saying to justify cutting their content budgets. Content marketers can analyze the content gaps created by a set of competitors when they scaled back on marketing, to identify opportunities for your business to fill those gaps. Filling competitive content gaps can be a powerful way to generate ROI from your marketing strategy.

So what are the best tactics to use for a content marketer seeking to fill some gaps? Here’s what I typically look for—

• Keyword opportunities: Which keywords are your competitors not covering, or covering poorly? A keyword gap analysis can reveal attractive keywords—those with high search volumes and relatively low difficulty scores—that your competitors are missing.
• Outdated content: Which of your competitors’ content is performing the best? Another efficient way to fill content gaps is by identifying your competitors’ content that performs well but is outdated, then creating newer and better content on that same topic.
• Broken backlinks: Imagine that your key competitor has a backlink on a relevant industry platform. Now imagine that that backlink is broken. Content marketers can build relationships with backlink owners and offer to replace broken backlinks with newer (and better) content from your organization. A double win!

4. Focus on maximizing value

Uncertain economic conditions and limited funding pools require content marketers to focus on maximizing the value derived from their budgets. Content marketers can maximize the value and impact of their contributions by prioritizing these strategies—

• Consistently generate positive ROI: Generating long-term value as a content marketer means ensuring that every initiative has a positive return on investment. Content marketers can carefully choose content types and channels to maximize profitability.
• Ruthlessly prioritize: The best content marketers know how to focus. Which channels does your audience occupy, and which types of content do they want? Let’s be there and make those, respectively.
• Quantify impact: Content marketing is both art and science, but its impact needs to be measured nonetheless. The content marketing strategies that add the most value are the ones that can be verified.

5. Use crypto winter as a time to build

Soft economies can be a great time to build, rebuild, and future-proof your business. A content marketing strategy is only as good as the digital context in which it operates—which is a nice way of saying that significant technical problems can derail even the most thoughtful content marketing plan. Crypto winter is an excellent time for blockchain and fintech companies to conduct content audits, attend to the overall health of their websites, and develop robust strategies for technical SEO.

Content marketing has long been a driver of growth—and that doesn’t change with market conditions. Building just gets a little easier to do when much of the competition backtracks or changes course.