It took a few years for the idea to catch on, but it’s fair to say the world knows all about Bitcoin now. The days when viral pranksters would hold up signs behind Janet Yellen in Congress or wield placards on Wall Street are gone. Bitcoin has won, along with everyone bold enough to have believed in it.
But the game has leveled up and there’s a new wave of digital asset projects with valuable services to offer the world. Digital asset wealth platforms; stablecoin applications providing payments; custodians delivering ice cold storage. They all need to get the word out there if the world is to learn about the benefits their crypto-based services bring. Which leaves just one question: how?
Getting Seen in All the Right Places
Patient community-building and organic growth can carry a digital asset business a long way. But there comes a point in time when you need to dip into your marketing budget and go direct. Billboards. Sports sponsorship. TV commercials. YouTube ads. The mediums that serve traditional businesses so well are equally effective when applied by their crypto counterparts.
If you’re part of the Dogecoin community, it’s fun – sorry, “much fun, such wow” – to sponsor a NASCAR driver. And entirely aligned with the qualities that make memecoins so exciting. But with no disrespect to Doge, most crypto firms have grander designs, and the real-world events they back should be more aspirational than gimmicky.
It is perfectly ok and even effective to sponsor sports that align with a more fun vision, or indeed sports that simply have a far and wide mainstream reach, like football – this Tezos’ sponsorship of Manchester United back in 2022. There is no denying that this approach works like a charm to gain brand awareness globally. But beyond brand awareness, sports sponsorships can do much more.
The Next Step: The Strategic Real-Life Value of Thoughtful Sports Partnerships
To build out our sports sponsorship programs beyond slapping a slogan on a soccer shirt and aiming for the highest visibility, we can take a page from traditional finance.
Institutional finance appears to prefer aligning with events such as golf tournaments, tennis championships, and sailing regattas. Pro golf and tennis embody the discipline that’s unequivocally required in sound digital asset management.
Golf emphasizes patience, strategic planning, and the ability to recover from setbacks through methodical improvement. Tennis demands quick adaptability while maintaining composure under pressure. These are the very qualities required for navigating fast-changing markets.
The industry shift to associating with key events like the DP World Tour is more than a rebranding effort. When crypto businesses throw their weight behind golf and tennis tournaments, they’re not just targeting affluent demographics: they’re aligning with values of calculated risk-taking, stability, precision, and long-term outlook.
Sponsorships in these worlds allow digital asset companies the space, environment, and opportunity to create meaningful engagements with key demographics. These include institutional investors, regulatory bodies, and other specialists who actually influence mainstream adoption.
Discussing the nuances of tokenization at a monster truck rally is challenging – but there’s a good chance you’ll get your point across at the golf. Effectively, sports like these offer sponsors more options to create bespoke real-life experiences for their clients. It helps in bringing more value to the end-user and expanding the concept of being a client at a wealth platform into a wider experience that includes both real-life engagements and specialized digital asset services.
The Long Game of Trust Building
The industry’s long-term prospects hinge on building trust rather than capturing fleeting attention. That’s why the smartest digital asset businesses are going an extra step in their sponsorships. Beyond simple and effective advertising, they are aligning themselves with brands whose values are a perfect match with those of their current clients. That’s not shouting from a billboard: it’s having a conversation in the hospitality suite.
This calls for adapting strategies that generate enduring credibility in lieu of those that are flashy but fizzle out fast. It means prioritizing precision over performance art and substance over sizzle. In a world where trust is the greatest currency of all, crypto businesses need to spend smarter and aim higher.
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