Add3, Content
April 11, 2023
7.4 min reading
Because everything moves so quickly in the crypto and blockchain, time is of the essence. In the time it takes a project to go to market, whole industries can change and shift. That’s why it’s critical to get your product to customers quickly and start providing real value. When a project has product market fit, it’s much more likely to succeed.
When more than 90% of blockchain startups fail within their first year of operation, it’s important to have a strategy. Many founders, even if they’ve succeeded in traditional tech, realize the complexity of navigating a largely unregulated market too late. Let’s talk about the importance of going to market fast and what hurdles new projects might face.
The open financial system is a constantly evolving landscape that moves at a breakneck pace. In the last two years, the industry has seen unprecedented shakeups that felt ongoing for months. If your project is first to market you'll gain a distinct, competitive advantage. And if you provide a service that people really need, you can have a first-mover advantage. This allows you to capture market share and gain credibility.
New technologies are emerging all the time and the market has new needs every day. Moving fast and being first to offer solutions can be critical to the success of a blockchain project.
In addition, Investors are often looking for projects that can demonstrate rapid growth and a clear path to profitability. By going to market quickly, blockchain projects can show investors that they are serious about their goals and have a plan in place to achieve them. It also gives them a chance to adapt and react to the market in real time. And if a project can weather market changes through launch, they’ll be even more impressive.
The blockchain space is rife with scams and fraudulent projects, making it difficult for legitimate projects to gain credibility. Going to market quickly will begin to establish a project's credibility and build trust with potential investors and users. Projects that make big promises and drag on and on, never developing real solutions become suspicious.
In order to deliver on the vision and promise of a project, founders need skilled developers. This can be difficult because there’s such a shortage of blockchain developer talent. For this reason, founders need to use their developers’ time wisely, focusing on things that move the needle. Don’t waste time coding and building unnecessary features. Stick to the MVP and target efforts to the most important features and functionalities.
In times of economic uncertainty, finding funding for a blockchain project can be especially difficult. Going to market quickly can demonstrate a project's viability and attract investment in a challenging market. When the macroeconomic environment is tough, tech funding tends to dry up. This means only the best and most promising projects have a chance at funding.
The blockchain space is crowded. Thousands of projects pop up every day and users have many options for where to spend their time and money. Going to market quickly gives users something to get excited about. Building a community around a functioning product or service becomes much easier.
Since the beginning of Bitcoin and blockchain, even the biggest projects aren’t immune to failure. There’s no such thing as “too big to fail” in the crypto world. Nobody is coming to bail out crypto if a founder runs the project into the ground. From Mt. Gox, to Terra Luna, to FTX, every day trust and longevity teeters on a precipice.
One way to accelerate the go-to-market timeline for blockchain projects is by using no-code platforms. Today, there aren’t as many no-code tools for blockchain as there are for web2, but that’s changing. No-code tools provide a faster and easier way to develop smart contracts, launch a token, and build a decentralized application (dApp) without writing a single line of code.
Reducing the cost of developing and coding smart contracts is one of the most significant benefits of no-code platforms. They provide templates and pre-built code snippets that you can use to develop your smart contracts. In some cases, like Add3, the entire token lifecycle can be managed in a few clicks. This saves time and reduces the risk of errors, which could cause the loss of funds or even project failure.
No-code platforms also save developer time building everything from scratch. It’s much more important for developers to focus on core product features than launch a token for the TGE.
The open financial system is highly competitive, and the proliferation of crypto scams makes credibility a valuable commodity. It's hard to find talented developers who understand blockchain technology. And it's even harder to secure funding when the macro economy and tech industry are struggling.
That's why going to market quickly, adapting fast, and gaining users in the space is such a steep hill to climb. Anything founders can do to streamline their project timeline will increase their chances of success. Spending two weeks on a rabbit trail feature that doesn’t improve the MVP could literally be a death blow.
Ultimately, getting your project to market quickly increases your chances of success. By using the right tools and focusing on core functionality you can place yourself ahead of the pack. Succeeding with a blockchain startup takes planning, skill, efficiency, and perhaps even a bit of luck.
