Author Topic: Is the Official Marketing Team Sleeping?  (Read 27542 times)

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Offline JWF

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My primary problem with the marketing or sales situation is the DENIAL OF TRANSPARENCY.


It just seems that no matter how many time this is brought up, it ALWAYS falls on deaf ears. It is fortunate that the concepts in BitShares are so good that we have all continued despite the above problem.


Nullstreet is the community's/MethodX's response to the lack of transparency, so we at least have that.

Offline fuzzy

I gotta agree with Rune. Even if Brian has something big planned, the total lack of action in the interim makes me think that he's not the person who should be leading this project. I'd feel much more comfortable having Methodx in charge of marketing. He took the time and effort to set up Nullstreet and get TONS of initiatives going in the meantime.

Does Brian deserve the opportunity to respond and prove himself? I guess so. Even if he can't reveal his "secret sauce" to the community, what he NEEDS to do at the very least is hold a meeting with the top guys from Nullstreet (Methodx, HPenvy) and describe to them in detail his plan. I trust those guys far more than I trust him, as they are active members of the community doing real things.

That being said, we've called for marketing transparency before and haven't gotten it. The one thing we CAN do is hire more marketing delegates, starting with Matt608 who is going to tackle Argentina, one of the most important markets out there for us. VOTE!

You have hit the heart of all these issues with this post.   +5%
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Offline matador123

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I gotta agree with Rune. Even if Brian has something big planned, the total lack of action in the interim makes me think that he's not the person who should be leading this project. I'd feel much more comfortable having Methodx in charge of marketing. He took the time and effort to set up Nullstreet and get TONS of initiatives going in the meantime.

Does Brian deserve the opportunity to respond and prove himself? I guess so. Even if he can't reveal his "secret sauce" to the community, what he NEEDS to do at the very least is hold a meeting with the top guys from Nullstreet (Methodx, HPenvy) and describe to them in detail his plan. I trust those guys far more than I trust him, as they are active members of the community doing real things.

That being said, we've called for marketing transparency before and haven't gotten it. The one thing we CAN do is hire more marketing delegates, starting with Matt608 who is going to tackle Argentina, one of the most important markets out there for us. VOTE!

merockstar

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Well the excuse so far has been "it's not ready for mainstream adoption yet."

Right?

I can totally see that as applicable. I'm an outright nerd and most of the people here are even worse than me. John Q. Sixpack is not ready. That's why I side with fuzzy on this one still.

I'm holding out hope that once everything is nice and sleek and bug free and forks are few and far in between if ever, several DAC services are coming up and running, there's a mobile phone client, plenty of onramps maybe a cap approaching a billion dollars... then boom!

Nuclear marketing explosion. Release of some killer app that's in the works. Integration into google play. Television commercials. Something. Who the hell knows.

Idk why, I could just see it playing out like that.

Offline davidpbrown

Without any information, it is easy to jump to conclusions. That said, marketing is all about communication and so little impact from the official marketing team is a missed opportunity for them; they could be using the community to leverage an order of magnitude more excitement.

Waiting for 1.0 is a lame excuse, given that bit-assets are there.. sell that opportunity now.

At a guess the mistake might be to have confused sales and marketing, overplayed the attendance in the real world and perhaps making pitches to big players in real world finance.. Miami might be nice at this time of year but online impact perhaps is more important at this stage, as is keeping the community engaged and not letting BM and other core devs unnecessarily waste their time on that.

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Offline bluebit

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We could have also used the money/Bitshares to give out to people on Bitshares Reddit, have grown the user base on reddit with giveaways. The marketing team must do regular giveaways and AMA's on reddit, we have less than 700 subscribers on there.
http://www.reddit.com/r/BitShares

Giveaways increase the # of registered users on Bitshares reddit and for the Bitshares wallet, and once those users get familiar with the software they tell their friends and also purchase assets to play with.
« Last Edit: December 15, 2014, 04:51:42 pm by bluebit »
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Offline fuzzy

@fuzzy the inconvenient truth is that there is no marketing campaign. There's bitshares.tv, but beyond that there is nothing.

But let's say they finally got scared into actually beginning to do something. Is that really the employees we want, even if they deliver? I'd say no, workers who have to be pushed to do their job are terrible in the long run. There are plenty of highly motivated and highly skilled marketers in nullstreet, each of them with CVs and portfolios at least as impressive as Brian's supposedly is. I've personally "met" 3 legitimate internet marketing professionals so far, and there is also hpenvy and matt806 who are clearly very passionate "doers". The crucial difference is they are proactive in their efforts, and they are members of our community, which is the single most important thing for a worker to be (and IMO a hard requirement). The opportunity to perform should be given them, the members of our community. Not Brian, a non-member, for the 10000th time.

I wish I could argue your points.  Almost 3 years worth of 100% delegate funding :/

I think we are just going to have to chalk this up to the growing pains of an industry where nearly everything we are doing is for the first time.  I have heard BM say that Brian has helped make them some big time connections--but the problem with that is that nothing has come from these connections to date.  What is worse---no updates...and no interfacing with the community.  The thing is, when someone is willing to stand up to a good trolling in this ecosystem and can stand tall afterwards...it brings a very tangible level of respect and trust. 

I am holding out hope, but I think you are being far more logical than I am in abandoning it.
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merockstar

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I remain optimistic, much as fuzzy.

It would be nice if he touched base with the community though.

My question is, hasn't his employ already been discontinued since August?

I'll continue on as brand champion for BitShares and will still be very involved with the BitShares team, but will no longer draw a salary.

Offline bluebit

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Bitshares has competition, not doing anything, isn't the right direction, especially if it's being payed.
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Offline Rune

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@fuzzy the inconvenient truth is that there is no marketing campaign. There's bitshares.tv, but beyond that there is nothing.

But let's say they finally got scared into actually beginning to do something. Is that really the employees we want, even if they deliver? I'd say no, workers who have to be pushed to do their job are terrible in the long run. There are plenty of highly motivated and highly skilled marketers in nullstreet, each of them with CVs and portfolios at least as impressive as Brian's supposedly is. I've personally "met" 3 legitimate internet marketing professionals so far, and there is also hpenvy and matt806 who are clearly very passionate "doers". The crucial difference is they are proactive in their efforts, and they are members of our community, which is the single most important thing for a worker to be (and IMO a hard requirement). The opportunity to perform should be given them, the members of our community. Not Brian, a non-member, for the 10000th time.

Offline bitcoinba

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How much evidence of a lack of production is needed before a change in leadership is considered in marketing?

How much money needs to be spent with out a measurable ROI? Does anyone realize that with just $10k/month the right leader could run an entire marketing company with constant measurable production? And, that is not even considering this glorious community of passionate volunteers...that goes ignored!

Waiting for 1.0 is simply the fashionable excuse for this quarter, and completely irrelevant. There are infinite amounts opportunities to gain traction, users, good will, PR, traffic and educate. I would understand it somewhat if we were talking about a completely volunteer effort that never got paid a nickel, but that is simply not the case. By that line of thinking we should be at 0 market cap, waiting for 1.0. It does not make any sense.

It is a shame that after a year so absolutely little has been produced and yet nothing has fundamentally changed with official marketing efforts and its structure.


What options do we have as a community/shareholders to make changes in this area? The official marketing team and strategy seems to be ideologically and intellectually opposed to the philosophy of Bitshares that drew me into this community in the beginning.

On a positive note, the Nullstreet boys are encouraging, and personally give me hope where I had honestly lost it in terms of marketing.





Offline matador123

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I agree that Bitmarket is doing great work. But Brian is the one in charge of marketing, and we have no idea what he's doing.

Let's have some transparency with the marketing. Please.

lzr1900

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Even if he suddenly started delivering (which at this point I highly doubt) as a stakeholder I wouldn't feel comfortable having him in a position of trust in the community.
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Offline fuzzy

I think the biggest low hanging fruit that could improve bitshares right now would be dissolving the official marketing team. Bitmarket is solid and doing real work, and should stay. I think this is due to the fact that he found the community on his own and the thing that primarily drives him is his passion for crypto.

Brian and murderistic seem to be motivated only by money, as evidenced by the fact that they haven't spent any of the millions of BTS given to them from the AGS fund, and murderistic even thought it would be appropriate to make a new delegate and ask for MORE funds! Me and and literally every person I've spoken to personally in this community would feel so much better if they were absolved of their duties and the AGS funds were either given to someone else, or just burned and thus given back to the community (who can manage funding on its own through the vastly superior system of delegate funding anyway).

I'd even be happy if Brian simply got to keep all the millions of BTS he has already received. I just don't think its good for this community to rely on him in any way any more. It's more a question of respect and loyalty to the community than anything else, and I think it has been proven beyond any doubt that he simply doesn't posses it. Even if he suddenly started delivering (which at this point I highly doubt) as a stakeholder I wouldn't feel comfortable having him in a position of trust in the community.

I think this is how 99% of the community feels. The reason why there has been so relatively little dissent (considering how strongly people feel this) is because more than anything else this community trusts bytemaster. But it's time to face reality and realize that Brian and murderistic have to go, no matter how hard and uncomfortable it is to admit.

As much as a part of me really resonates with this, I feel like we should hold out until this marketing campaign launches.  At this point it matters little if we dissolve the official marketing team or keep it except that if we dissolve it we are 100% certain it was a failure.  If we let it go through, at least there is a sliver of a chance they prove the community wrong.  I would truly like Brian to have that opportunity...especially if he does.

Official:

adjective
1. relating to an authority or public body and its duties, actions, and responsibilities.

noun
1. a person holding public office or having official duties, especially as a representative of an organization or government department.

----

We are doing us all a disservice to use the word 'Official' in reference to this particular marketing team.

I wish I could agree.  What makes this marketing team "Official" is that they were paid a lump sum in the very beginning (to be fair "they" was Brian).  People are upset for good reason imho as Brian gladly accepted a very large sum of money and the community has seen very little that reassures them he has earned it.  I sincerely believe that had Brian interfaced with the community on a regular basis it would have at the very least served to instill a level of trust that he no longer can easily regain. 

Over the course of 6-8 months of this festering...there were ample opportunities to really make everyone feel like he was first and foremost there for them.  Bytemaster as always served as the perfect model of trust in this ecosystem.  All Brian had to do was (somewhat) emulate him.  Even if he is doing awesome work behind the scenes, he does himself a severe disservice by ignoring the community's concerns.  We are a community built on the need for transparency after all.
« Last Edit: December 15, 2014, 04:30:09 pm by fuzzy »
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Offline Empirical1.1

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Just came here to say that bitmarket has been doing good work so far.

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