Plug the gaps in your growth stack; growth tools for the network economy

The transition to Web3 presents a new set of head-scratching challenges for growth teams; one of the most fundamental being their toolbox. Gaps in the traditional growth stack have become painfully apparent as the digital landscape shifts towards decentralisation.

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This guide will focus on some of the tools emerging to plug these gaps. These platforms are designed to bridge the gaps between Web2 and 3, helping teams navigate growth in the era of decentralised data, governance, and privacy.

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Governance & Community Management

The Gap

Decentralised governance is pivotal to many Web3 projects, but most Web2 platforms don’t support vital mechanics like community voting, proposal management, and stakeholder communication.

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Recommended Tools:

Aragon

Use-Cases: Aragon serves as a toolkit for creating decentralised autonomous organisations (DAOs) and for community fund management. It's highly customisable, which is great, although that versatility is a bit of a double edged sword when it comes to usability, in that the modular interface can be a little overwhelming for new users.

Performance: Aragon have gone out of their way to make DAO organisation and governance accessible, but ultimately a deep understanding of smart contract interactions is still required to make sense of that flexibility.

Snapshot

Use-Cases: Snapshot aims to facilitate off-chain voting to reduce the cost of governance interactions. Be warned however that while innovative, the off-chain nature of voting could be regarded as less secure by community members.

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Performance: Snapshot is generally quick in tallying votes and has a strong track record for user participation. Its overall effectiveness is really contingent on how actively it is integrated into a project's overall governance strategy.

Collab.Land

Use-Cases: Collab.Land is primarily used for token-gated access to Discord/ Telegram communities, offering a way to verify and manage members. It brings a new dimension to community engagement, where the members' involvement can be recognized and rewarded in a transparent and immutable way.

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Performance: While effective for community moderation, it does tether the project to a centralised platform (Discord), which could be a sticking point for users seeking purer forms of decentralisation. Authentication is generally quick, but some users find the token-based gating system exclusionary.

CRM

The Gap

Traditional CRM tools are not built to handle decentralised identity, or the privacy standards of Web3.

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Recommended Tools:

3Box

Use-Cases: 3Box offers decentralised profile creation and data storage for Dapps, geared toward enhancing user engagement within the constraints of Web3's privacy norms. 

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Performance: The tool uses high-level encryption for user data and supports multiple platforms, however integration can be complex, depending on the Dapp’s architecture. It’s also worth pointing out that while 3Box aims to offer a unified identity across platforms, adoption is not yet universal, which is a limiting factor. It may well become a more complete solution in time.

POAP

Use-Cases: POAP (Proof of Attendance Protocol) is designed to facilitate event-based token issuance at virtual and physical events, to both verify and reward attendance. With a focus on specialised campaigns and community engagement, POAP aims to introduce blockchain utility into the realm of event management and marketing.

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Performance: The system generally issues tokens quickly, but its effectiveness in driving engagement is a little anecdotal, and can vary depending on the event’s appeal.

Onboarding

The Gap

The barrier to entry for using Web3 products can be high due to its technical nature. Simplifying this process is essential for adoption and growth.

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Recommended Tools:

Torus

Use-Cases: Torus simplifies blockchain account creation by allowing email-based logins for Dapps. While this lowers the entry barrier, it also centralises a part of the user experience, which could be counterintuitive for decentralisation purists.

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Performance: The onboarding process is generally fast, but concerns about security and data privacy remain due to the Web2-style, email-based authentication system.

MetaMask

Use-Cases: MetaMask facilitates easy onboarding into Web3 ecosystems through its browser extension and mobile app, simplifying interactions with dApps and securing transactions. More than just a wallet, it serves as an accessible entry point to DeFi and NFTs for noobs.

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Performance: The wallet is known for its strong security features but has been criticised for its user interface, which some users find less than intuitive.

RabbitHole

Use-Cases: RabbitHole gamifies onboarding and skill building by setting users blockchain-based tasks. While it offers an innovative approach to user engagement, its suitability can be niche, focusing mainly on users who are already somewhat familiar with blockchain transactions.

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Performance: RabbitHole claims to have dynamic reward mechanisms and high user engagement rates, however the user experience is really dependent on the complexity of the tasks and the clarity of the instructions provided. If you’re targeting a less technical audience, it may not be that helpful.

Automation

The Gap

Growth relies heavily on automated processes to achieve scale, but integrating Web2 and Web3 platforms can be difficult. 

Metacommerce

Use-Cases: Metacommerce is a Segment-type platform that enables brands to easily integrate their Web2 and 3 tools. It promises to bridge the gap between Web2 and 3, creating a unified view of all your data.

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Performance: It’s a young product, and reviews are a bit thin on the ground. We’re happy someone is building this though, as the automation gap is a pressing problem.

Marketing & Outreach

The Gap

Conventional marketing tools can be antithetical to the privacy and security tenets of Web3, relying on cookie-based tracking or centralised databases. Teams embracing this ethos must adopt marketing tools that privilege user privacy, employing non-intrusive methods for targeting and outreach.

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Recommended Tools:

Subsocial

Use-Cases: Subsocial is a decentralised social media platform that allows users to create their own "Spaces" akin to subreddits or Facebook Groups. Built around principles of user control and censorship-resistance, Subsocial aims to balance user-friendliness with the complexities of Web3 technology.

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Performance: Like any new platform, its effectiveness is largely dependent on user adoption and engagement rates. The reality is that as of today, its user base is nowhere near as extensive as traditional social media platforms. Speed and scalability can also vary due to its decentralised nature.

MintGate

Use-Cases: MintGate enables content gating based on token ownership. Designed for specialised marketing campaigns and exclusive content access, MintGate are one of several companies aiming to blend the benefits of token economics with the dynamics of content distribution to enhance community engagement.

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Performance: While it’s relatively easy to set up, its performance as a marketing tool is highly dependent on how much demand exists for the gated content, making its effectiveness variable.

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Also worth a look:

• Roll - A platform that allows creators and communities to mint their own social tokens.
• Rally - Similar to Roll, but with a stronger focus on integration with mainstream social media platforms.

Analytics & Data Management

The Gap

Data-driven decision making is central to growth, but Web2 analytics tools are not built to understand blockchain transactions, or interpret decentralised data layers. In order to collect, interpret, and visualise decentralised data, growth teams need to augment their analytics stack with specialised tools.

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Recommended:

Nansen.ai

Use-Cases: Nansen analyses blockchain data with a focus on smart contract interactions, on-chain investor behaviour, and token movement. A notable feature is its ability to label wallet addresses, giving users insights into the behaviours of various crypto entities.

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Performance: Nansen is a great resource for understanding asset flow within an ecosystem. The speed of data retrieval depends on the complexity of the query and the load on the servers, which can sometimes make things a little slow.

The Graph

Use-Cases: The Graph is a decentralised protocol for indexing and querying data from blockchains, essentially acting as the Google for blockchain data. It allows users to access various APIs called subgraphs, which can be used to retrieve blockchain data across multiple chains.

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Performance: The Graph claims high query accuracy and scalability, but GLP, the query language it uses, is a steep learning curve, even for those well versed in languages like SQL. Like any decentralised system, performance can vary based on network conditions and the specific subgraphs being accessed.

Dune Analytics

Use-Cases: Dune Analytics is a community-based platform for exploring and visualising Ethereum data. Users create and share dashboards and analyses, fostering a collaborative environment. This feature makes it particularly user-friendly and an excellent tool for community insights and crowd-sourced data analysis.

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Performance: Dune Analytics provides a range of dashboarding features and the user-contributed query library is a great resource for less technical users. As ever, complex queries can sometimes experience latency.