Don't be too nervous; launching only accounts for 10%-20% of your long-term success. Don't make it complicated.
Original: ehwangah
Compiled by: Yuliya, PANews
Let's start with a reality: in the crypto space, market capitalization is the core metric for measuring success. Technical innovation, core value capture, product-market fit (PMF), and other factors are important, but the true indicator of whether you have delivered multiple returns for your team, investors, and holders is whether your market cap can soar. So how do you achieve this?
Launch immediately, build while publicly showcasing > Don't get overly caught up in launch details or keep postponing.
Don't be too nervous; launching only accounts for 10%-20% of your long-term success. Don't make it complicated. Here’s a brief summary:
Overhyped launch with no substance: wild fluctuations
Low-key launch with no substance: direct failure
Overhyped launch with substantial support: take off to the peak
Low-key launch with substantial support: steady growth
Do you see the pattern? The key is to create substantial content (we will discuss how to create substantial content in detail later; in short, it’s about the team, product, and community). A simple test is: are your friends willing to buy, hold, and believe in your project? If they don’t trust it, others won’t either.
Why is launching early the best choice?
- Validate your idea before investing over $100,000 in development costs
Instead of spending three months or longer and investing hundreds of thousands of dollars polishing the product, launching early can help you validate the concept. Similar to lean startup practices, propose an idea, spark interest among target users, and iterate based on validation. You might think this approach is unconventional, but it can help you cultivate your initial 1,000 true believers, who will become catalysts for project growth, whether in terms of network, resources, or pricing.
The focus is: validate the idea first; don’t wait until you’ve spent a lot of time and costs to validate.
- Establish a leading position and leverage the Lindy effect
Do you know why the top 50 projects maintain their leading positions through cycles? It’s not just about quality; it’s also about the advantages of time and position, known as the Lindy effect. Launching early gives you a stronger community of holders, allowing you to gradually weed out the uncommitted users and attract loyal supporters. Time is your ally.
If you wait too long, inferior projects may take your place. Once others capture your narrative, funding, or attention, it will be very difficult to reclaim it. In the PVP competition on X (Twitter), it’s hard to get those who have already "entered" to switch to other projects.
In the current AI agent craze, launching first is not just a bonus; it’s a decisive factor. Everyone is rushing to launch AI agents, and joining the race early gives you an advantage in the ecosystem, while others can only chase your footsteps.
Whether we like it or not, launching projects in the crypto market involves an "attention game." While product-driven growth is important, that’s a later concern. Attracting attention first and building a community is crucial, and tokens are the best tools for distribution and interest alignment.
Projects that choose to launch in the Virtuals ecosystem typically gain a competitive advantage. The overall culture of this ecosystem is marked by high quality, and in the long run, capital tends to flow towards quality projects.
- Immediately create community and distribution effects
Launching a project will spark discussions; people on X (Twitter) will start talking about your project and summarizing "three reasons to buy/hold." This discussion is invaluable—not just because of price increases, but because it solidifies the community. This group can help you iterate on the product, test new features, and even contribute development resources. On the first day of launch, you will have a group of loyal users.
- You can get ahead of the many VC-backed token projects in 2025
Many projects delayed their launches during the bear market of 2024, believing that low liquidity and risk aversion leading to low market sentiment were not suitable for launching. By 2025, you will see more projects launching, following a typical route:
Raising large amounts of funding from VCs;
Polishing the product, then launching marketing activities (points, tasks, KOL collaborations, etc.);
Subsequently conducting a token generation event (TGE).
What is your advantage? A fair launch, decentralized spirit, and naturally growing community. Market dynamics have shifted, now more favorable to you.
What if I build the product first?
A solid product can indeed bring a competitive advantage, but it’s not the only determining factor. As an early project, the crypto market itself is also in its early stages, and whether the team can continuously create value is crucial. To be honest, if the crypto market were entirely utility and product-driven, then "airdrop tokens" wouldn’t attract a large buying interest.
This is not to advocate for launching "airdrop projects," but to say that launching early can give you a competitive advantage in community building and narrative shaping.
Product launches are never perfect; there will always be bugs, server overloads, concurrency issues, etc. Don’t overly emphasize these problems; as updates iterate, the product will ultimately prove itself.
Build in public, document the journey
People love to see how a team creates value from scratch. The story matters; people are more willing to support relatable founders rather than cold brands. Building in public makes the project more approachable and humanized.
There’s no need to have a perfect brand image on day one; start early, from the initial draft. Grow through public building. It’s advisable to study the success stories of the top 20 projects in the Virtuals ecosystem.
Frequently Asked Questions
About snipers: they exist on all chains; the key is to maintain user stickiness and ecosystem strength.
Tokenomics design and agent launch structure: experience based on over 100 launch cases can provide suggestions.
G.A.M.E framework: provides open-source SDK to support customization needs.
Business model: can integrate existing business models.
Existing token integration: corresponding solutions are available.
Trust issues with no product launch: analogous to Kickstarter projects, early feedback is the most valuable.
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