Author: Samantha Yap, Founder and CEO of YAP Global.
The cryptocurrency bull market is in full swing, and the familiar cycle is playing out: Bitcoin breaks historical highs, retail investors flock in, and new projects are launched in quick succession. In this frenzy, projects often make a common mistake: treating marketing as a "band-aid" for an unfinished product, and when problems arise, they blame marketing. This tension between creating value and capturing market momentum has become a core issue in industry activities, such as the recent g(t)m conference held in Bangkok—but the impact of this challenge extends far beyond any single discussion.
This rush to market has led to a "graveyard" of failed projects. Since 2014, of the more than 24,000 cryptocurrencies listed on CoinGecko, 14,000 have been declared failures. Critics often attribute these failures to "marketing hype." However, according to an analysis by DappRadar, the real core factors leading to failure are a lack of product-market fit, poor financial management, and technical flaws.
Consider what makes you trust a cryptocurrency project. First is the technical foundation—code, team, tokenomics. But how they present themselves is equally crucial. Can they explain complex technical concepts in an understandable way? Are community updates consistent? Do they respond transparently to questions rather than simply avoiding them? These signals profoundly reveal the project's commitment to long-term development.
Attracting users is far from enough. You must also prove that you are trustworthy. The most successful projects intuitively understand this, focusing on advancing the project itself, which is, in fact, a form of technical marketing. Take the rise of Uniswap as an example: while other decentralized exchanges focused solely on technical features, Uniswap strategically upgraded each version to solve user problems—from v2 expanding token pairs to v3 introducing flexible fee tiers to accommodate different risk preferences. They clearly grasp community needs and provide genuinely valuable improvements.
Today’s most effective cryptocurrency marketing prioritizes education over hype. This shift reflects a deep understanding of building trust in the industry. When Coinbase released its "State of Cryptocurrency" report, they were helping users understand fundamental developments such as institutional adoption and market infrastructure changes.
The best marketers play the role of "translators," converting complex blockchain concepts into clear language that users at all levels can understand. After all, a user who understands the protocol and actively participates is worth far more than those who merely chase short-term returns.
As the industry matures, project teams are gradually realizing that sustainable growth comes from having a user base that understands the content of their investments and its significance.
The reality of cryptocurrency media is that it operates extremely efficiently: hundreds of project pitches flood journalists' inboxes each week, and only the strongest, highest-quality reports can stand out. This competitive environment demands the demonstration of real achievements and progress—if your project is not ready for rigorous scrutiny, marketing cannot save it. On the contrary, marketing will only accelerate the project's decline. Every public statement becomes a severe test of the project's fundamentals.
Many founders fail to recognize that this rigorous screening process is actually beneficial for the entire ecosystem. Media and market attention can expose weak projects early, preventing larger-scale failures. Project failures are not due to marketing itself, but because marketing reveals pre-existing flaws—unstable technical foundations, unsustainable token economic models, or half-baked business strategies. This can be seen as a natural selection mechanism in the cryptocurrency space: only projects that can withstand scrutiny and are ready for mass adoption will survive.
It is becoming increasingly clear in 2024 that marketing should not be seen as a scapegoat for the cryptocurrency industry, but rather as a powerful tool for establishing project legitimacy that should be used cautiously and strategically. The rise in Bitcoin prices has drawn retail investors back into the space and brought unprecedented attention to cryptocurrency—this is the moment for marketing to shine. Effective marketing serves both as a filter and a driver, helping users distinguish serious long-term projects from fleeting phenomena while making complex technologies more accessible to newcomers. If misused, crypto projects may scapegoat marketing, creating false hype through underdeveloped and immature technologies—this tarnishes the reputation of crypto marketing professionals.
This natural selection process is essential for a maturing industry. To bring cryptocurrency to the next billion users, we need more transparency rather than ambiguity; we need education rather than hype, and continuous communication rather than sensational viral marketing. Responsible marketing can provide these values. In an industry built on transparency and a commitment to decentralization, this is not only good business strategy but also a necessary condition for long-term success.
Samantha Yap is the founder and CEO of YAP Global, an international public relations and communications consultancy focused on helping crypto and Web3 organizations tell their development stories. With a background as an international journalist and producer, Samantha founded YAP Global in 2018 to bridge the gap between emerging blockchain technologies and mainstream media.
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This article is for general reference only and should not be considered legal or investment advice. The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in the article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.
Original article: “Marketing Shouldn’t Be the Scapegoat in Crypto”
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