The Tokens You Should Worry About
What are social tokens? A social token is a digital contract that can be used as a currency, used to track ads like coupons, or used to hold a specific digital item such as, a rare artwork.
In a nutshell, a token is tradeable asset or thingy on top of a blockchain. Tokens can be used for investment purposes, to store value, or to make purchases much like a crypto coin. I’d like to point out tho that in the crypto world, coins are very different from tokens. Tokens refer to cryptocurrencies that don’t use their own experimental blockchains, and instead rely on proven solid blockchains like Ethereum, which is the largest blockchain adaption since 2021.
Much like crypto coins, tokens also enable the transfer of value. However, in most cases, a coin its just that: a payment medium. A token on the other hand, has additional options such as the power to program a token to do anything, something a basic coin cannot do.
MARKETING
Back in the days when wifi wasn’t invented yet, it was difficult for a marketing executive to track how effective a TV commercial was. The first coupon was invented by Coca Cola back in the year 1888, where it mailed to potential customers and magazines a ticket for a free glass of Coke. Between 1894 and 1913 Coca-Cola has successfully received back a total of 8.5Million tickets, and grown exponentially to open shops in every state in the US.
This gave Coca Cola a massive growth, becoming the biggest softdrink company in the world. Coke became a worldwide sensation, a culture for all holidays.
By the mid-1990s, the idea of coupons had moved to the internet. Terms like vouchers, promo codes, or referral rewards meant the same thing, and would later become the foundation of internet marketers to use different words for different marketing strategies to see which one works best.
PROMO CODE COUNTING
By counting the number of codes they receive back from customers, marketers would be able to count them, and tally which strategy was working and which ones were bad. Assigning unique numbers & letters to a coupon lets the marketer know how the customer saw the promotion, be it from an email, or social media, and they’d be able to analyze the effectiveness of the advertising. By entering the promo code, the customer tells where, when, and how the ad convinced him/her to buy.
When transportation costs dropped, free shipping vouchers and cashback coupons were introduced.
However, up to this point, tracking coupons was only semi-automated, it still required a manual process during collection and tallying, simply because the payment system is NOT DIRECTLY TIED TO THE COUPON SYSTEM. This is where social tokens come in.
By becoming both the coupon and the currency, social tokens like the million token integrates the entire ecosystem in a unified ledger called the blockchain.
A social token is a direct way for an influencer to interact and represent branded value to their fans. Typically when you want to support an creator you buy their merch, tickets to their show, or even watch their videos.
Catering to fans require a lot of effort, especially in the design and distribution of merch, and can sometimes result in a burn out for many creators, leaving them no room to focus on what really matters to fans — connection. To solve this, a creator uses social tokens as a way to connect, interact, and give the fans a reason to come together by encouraging them on an ecosystem of trading stamps, cryptokitties, artworks, merch & discount rewards, without the need for complicated infrastructure. Simply, just one social token, connecting everything.
Social tokens are truly the future of the world markets. By the way, I am going to release a book about tech & finance so stay tuned for updates. Follow me on Medium.
