By the year 2028, the number of DeFi users is expected to be 22.09 million users. While this is good news for every Decentralized Finance enthusiast, it also means that as interest in DeFi continues to grow at a massive rate, so also does the competition.

It has therefore become necessary, more than ever, to stand out in the crowded DeFi market.

Hence, a highly efficient way through which DeFi projects are attracting users and investors even amidst all the competition is DeFi marketing and advertising.

In this comprehensive guide, we delve into everything you need to know to commence your journey of marketing your DeFi projects.

What is DeFi Marketing & Advertising?

DeFi or Decentralized finance marketing involves strategies employed in promoting and spreading the word about a DeFi project so as to give it as much attention and publicity as possible and attract both users and investors.

DeFi advertising, on the other hand, is a subset of DeFi marketing that entails directly promoting a DeFi project to a targeted audience to drive immediate actions.

Hence, through advertising and marketing DeFi, potential users are made to see everything they stand to gain when they use DeFi platforms and products.

While DeFi marketing includes, but is not limited to creating educational content, partnering with influencers, and building a community, just to mention a few; DeFi advertising can involve placing ads on social media platforms and websites to encourage people to use the DeFi services.

As a financial system built on blockchain technology, DeFi continues to establish itself as the modern, transparent, and cheaper way of directly transacting money without the need for a middleman or third party.

Thanks to everything it’s doing different from traditional finance, the DeFi market continues to witness notable growth.

A report by Binance research shows that DeFi’s total value locked (TVL) has been driven up by 75.1% since the beginning of the year, going from $54.2 billion to a whopping $94.9 billion. 

The DeFi market revenue is also projected to reach US$26,170.0 million in 2024 and is expected to grow to US$37,040.0m by 2028.

These show the promising future and growth potential DeFi holds for its users and investors.

Benefits of DeFi Marketing & Advertising

Any Web3 product or service whatsoever that wants to get the attention and traction it deserves needs marketing.

Likewise, DeFi projects that need to be widely seen and, in turn, attract the right users need to be marketed. And not only users but also investors looking to invest in DeFi products and services.

When DeFi projects are promoted and advertised to a broad audience, the interests of users and investors are captured. Mind you, these users and investors may not have known about these platforms and services without the marketing of these projects.

Moreover, even those who have known about the projects may not see it as what they should use or invest in. But through DeFi marketing, everything in it for them is brought into the limelight.

As the popularity of DeFi keeps growing, so does the competition and one way to stand out amidst all the competition is DeFi marketing.

Also, by marketing DeFi, trust and credibility are established. Users understand the projects better, giving them the confidence to use them and even refer other potential users.

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Top DeFi Marketing Strategies

For your DeFi marketing efforts to yield the kind of results you desire, you need to adopt strategies that have been tested and trusted.

To help you figure this out, we have gathered the top strategies that can help you attract, engage and retain users for your DeFi project.

You can check out our web3 marketing playbook for additional insights and strategies on Web3 marketing, which includes DeFi.

Content Marketing

Content marketing, which involves creating and sharing content online, remains one of the most effective strategies when it comes to marketing anything online. It is a highly effective way of attracting users, clearing their doubts, alleviating their fears and building trust, loyalty and retention. 

Social Media Marketing

With over 5 billion social media users in the world, it is no wonder why using social media platforms to draw attention to your DeFi projects is very worthwhile.

Promoting your projects on platforms like Telegram, Twitter, and Reddit help in getting your DeFi projects seen and interacted with by your target audience.

Email Marketing

This is an effective, more personalized approach to marketing your DeFi projects to your audience.

Through email marketing, you can keep your audience informed on new developments and special offers. You can also create segmented lists so that the right content goes to the right audience. 

Influencer Marketing

By tapping into the influence of well-known figures in the crypto space, you can get massive traction and interest in your DeFi project. This is because people already know, like and trust these influencers, so whatever they put out there will be seen as credible by their audience.

Influencer Marketing is also a great way to reach a wider audience you otherwise wouldn’t have had access to. You can find these social media influencers on YouTube, Facebook, Linkedin, and Instagram.

Airdrops and Quests

People love free things. This is why airdrops are very effective in boosting your audience's interest and attracting new users to your DeFi project. Airdrop is a marketing ploy that involves giving some free tokens in exchange for an activity on the part of your audience. You can also create crypto quests for your audience to participate in and earn rewards.

Newsletter Sponsorship

Although less utilized, sponsoring a top crypto newsletter is a highly effective DeFi marketing strategy.

A newsletter sponsorship is an advertisement placed in the body of an email newsletter.

By advertising in a respected newsletter, you can reach a targeted audience of engaged crypto enthusiasts. Doing this helps you drive significant traffic and interest to your DeFi project.

Best DeFi Marketing Channels to Use

All marketing channels are equal, but some are more equal than others. Hence the need for the right marketing channel to aid you in marketing your DeFi project.

The market size for online advertising is expected to grow to $786.2 billion by 2026. There is a sure way to stay ahead of the competition. And that is to use a marketing channel that will ensure your DeFi advertising reaches your ideal audience.

Crypto PPC with Blockchain-Ads

Pay-per-click advertising on a crypto advertising network like Blockchain-Ads can help target potential users actively looking for DeFi solutions.

With Blockchain-Ads’ crypto PPC advertising, you get targeted reach, high engagement, and fewer restrictions compared to traditional platforms, giving room for high reach and audience engagement.  

Social Media Ads

With social media ads, you get the kind of advertising that is specifically targeted at the users who are likely to be interested in your project. This is an effective marketing channel with a high ROI because your marketing efforts are directed towards the right people.

Other benefits of social media ads include high engagement, increase in brand awareness and cost effectiveness.

Crypto PR sites

Crypto PR sites publish and distribute press releases that have to do with Blockchain and cryptocurrency.

Using these sites to promote your DeFi project has several advantages. Your project gains visibility. Since it is targeted, you reach the right people. Your project’s credibility also improves, especially if you publish on a site with a good reputation.

A reputable site that can help you achieve this is the Blockchain-Ads’ crypto PR distribution platform. By using this platform, you can be sure that your press releases will reach a broad audience in the crypto community.

Influencer Advertising

Collaborating with influencers with significant following continues to be an effective way of driving high engagement, trust and recognition for your brand and project.

When choosing an influencer to help you market your DeFi project, ensure the influencer’s audience is those who would be interested in what you have to offer. This is because an influencer having a large following that is not interested in cryptocurrency or blockchain will only result in wasted marketing efforts.

Also, be sure to do your research and ensure that the influencer genuinely markets products, like it's theirs. The reason for this is that If the audience can't see the authenticity in the influencer advertising your DeFi project, they might not engage, let alone become a user.

DeFi Marketing & Advertising Tactics

Knowing your way around DeFi marketing is very important. It can determine how fast or how slow your target audience warms up to what you are offering.

Here are some methods that can help you market your DeFi projects better:

Brand Building

Building a strong brand also gives you access to a larger audience and positions you as an authority in your field. It also increases your target audience’s awareness of your decentralized finance project.

Community Engagement

Creating an active and engaged online community promotes a sense of belonging, trust and loyalty. Activities you can engage in to make your online community thrive include supporting members of your community, organizing fun activities and rewarding your existing users.

Event Marketing

Events are great opportunities to showcase your project and connect with potential users and investors. You can either host or participate in online and offline events, such as webinars, conferences, and meetups. 

Public Relations

Public relations can go a long way in boosting your DeFi marketing efforts. By maintaining a positive public image through strategic communication and media relations, you build credibility, reach more users and attract positive attention to your project.

Other benefits of positive PR include building trust, credibility and fostering loyalty in your community.

Referral Programs

Referral programs are very effective because people tend to accept referrals from people they are already familiar with. Encouraging your existing users by offering incentives to refer new users can help rapidly extend your reach and expand your user base.

Measuring Success in DeFi Marketing & Advertising

There are various web3 tools that can help you measure and determine how successful your DeFi marketing efforts are.

Using these tools to analyze the performance of your decentralized finance marketing has numerous advantages. One of these advantages is providing insights into what strategies are working and what needs improvement.

Also, using these web3 tools helps ensure that marketing and advertising efforts are in alliance with the overall objectives of the DeFi project. This helps to maintain focus and direction.

An excellent tool that can help keep track of your DeFi marketing and advertising performance is Blockchain-Ad’s dashboard.

Using Blockchain-Ads for your DeFi advertising grants you access to our powerful dashboard that integrates on-chain activity tracking with Google Analytics, providing advertisers with comprehensive insights.

By combining on-chain data with Google Analytics, the dashboard enables advertisers to correlate user sessions with specific on-chain actions, offering a holistic view of user behavior and engagement.

This integration allows advertisers to identify the exact sessions that result in desired actions, providing valuable data for optimizing marketing strategies in the DeFi space.

Blaze App is another web3 tool that can help you see the results your DeFi marketing is yielding. With Blaze’s campaign and social analytics tools, you can get a solid insight into whether or not your marketing strategies are working.

Cookie3 is yet another web3 tool that can help you measure your DeFi marketing success. Through its web3 version of Google Analytics - Cookie Analytics, Cookie3 can help track and analyze your marketing campaign performance using your audience's on-chain and off-chain data.

DeFi Marketing & Advertising Case Studies

When done right, DeFi marketing can yield some really amazing results, as can be seen in the following case studies:

Blockchain-Ads x Binance APAC

Blockchain-Ads ran a super-targeted ad campaign to bring high-value traders to Binance APAC. The DeFi marketing success came down to smart targeting and strategic planning by Blockchain-Ads.

Focusing on attracting high-value traders in regions like the Middle East, South East Asia, and Eastern Asia, they ran a successful cost-per-acquisition campaign by looking at on-chain behaviors and specific crypto profiles.

With just $25,000 in ad spend, they brought in 4,600 new users and saw a whopping 19.8x return on investment. This shows how effective targeted ads can be in the crypto world, especially in growing markets like Asia.

You can check out the full Binance case study.

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Defiway Campaign on Blockchain-Ads

Another very successful DeFi marketing is the Defiway campaign which successfully onboarded 1,227 new traders and generated a 12.5x return on ad spend.

Blockchain-Ads achieved this by targeting Web3 natives, crypto staking users, and DeFi traders with specific portfolio values.

By promoting easy, low-commission cross-chain swaps and leveraging hooks like "Only 0.2% Commission" and "Bridge Faster," created a positive sentiment within the community.

The campaign's focus on credibility and social proof further enhanced brand awareness and ROI within just 60 days.

See the complete Defiway campaign case study.

Coinbase DeFi Marketing Campaign for SEA

Yet another successful campaign is Blockchain-Ads attracting 3,896 new traders to Coinbase in Southeast Asia. 

The marketers achieved this by using targeted advertising based on on-chain behavior.

Targeting profiles using Ethereum (ETH), Solana, Algorand, NEAR, Polygon (excluding Binance Smart Chain), the focus was placed on attracting high-value crypto traders.

This resulted in 33,303 transactions and a trading volume of $8,129,653 within 60 days.

All these serve as proof that using the right channel for your DeFi marketing and advertising can yield massive returns.

Read the full Coinbase SEA case study.

DeFi Advertising with Blockchain-Ads

One of the most important recipes of success when marketing DeFi is reaching those interested in your project. The more visible you are to the right people, the more you campaign goals you complete.

But marketing DeFi is not something you can just plunge into as it requires the know-how and experience of knowing what works for what and what doesn't.

That's why using DeFi ad networks like Blockchain-Ads to run targeted decentralized finance advertising campaigns can help your ideal users see your DeFi project.

Since your content is promoted on platforms that DeFi users frequent, you can be rest assured of getting a significant return on ad spend. You can check out the Blockchain-Ads platform review to see how it helps you achieve your DeI marketing goals.

‍Get in touch with us to get your DeFi advertising campaign started.

More on Marketing DeFi

Why Is a Well-Planned DeFi Marketing Strategy Important?

For your DeFi project to enjoy the kind of success you envision, your marketing strategy must be well-crafted. It must also be structured in a way that helps you achieve your goals of reaching your potential users and investors.

A carefully planned DeFi marketing strategy aids in achieving this. But a poorly planned one can ruin your chances of getting the attention of your target audience.

The complex and evolving nature of DeFi also makes it of utmost importance to have a solid marketing strategy to gain more users for your DeFi project.

What Is a Community in DeFi Marketing?

A community in DeFi marketing has to do with a group of individuals who are interested in your project. Building a community has a way of fostering a sense of connection and loyalty.

The community plays a crucial role in the success and growth of a DeFi project as they provide feedback, engage in educational activities and inform other users about the project.

By actively engaging your community on social media platforms through activities like discussions and forums, you can gather feedback that can help you improve your DeFi marketing efforts.

Also, a community serves as the perfect avenue to further educate prospective users and investors about the project.

You can create communities on platforms like Telegram and Discord.

What Are Airdrops in DeFi Marketing?

Airdrops are when free tokens are given to a specific group of users. Airdrops are an effective way of getting the word out and increasing the user base for your DeFi project.

While the tokens are free, recipients usually engage in an activity to get them. This can include staking tokens, or using a service. Recipients performing these activities can bring about an increase in the engagement and visibility of the DeFi project.

After receiving the airdrops, it is only natural that the users want others to know about the free token they have received, thereby attracting more users, boosting interest in the project and giving it access to a wider audience. 

What Do PR Campaigns Involve in DeFi Marketing?

Public Relations or PR campaigns involve a series of activities designed to promote a DeFi project. These can include press releases, content marketing, community management, events, to mention a few.

The aim of PR campaigns in DeFi marketing is to create a positive image, build trust, and drive engagement with the project's target audience. 

Why Should I Consider a DeFi Advertising Agency?

A trustworthy and reputable marketing agency can help you navigate the complexity of DeFi marketing. And also assist you in running a marketing campaign that helps you achieve your goals, which is acquiring users and investors for your project. Our guide on DeFi marketing agencies can help you find the best optoins out there.