Expose Cardano Ecosystem to 2.6M people

[GENERAL] Name and surname of main applicant

Liâm Bodin

[GENERAL] Are you delivering this project as an individual or as an entity (whether formally incorporated or not)

Entity (Incorporated)

[GENERAL] Co-proposers and additional applicants

Emile Stantina

[GENERAL] Please specify how many months you expect your project to last (from 2-12 months)

5

[GENERAL] Please indicate if your proposal has been auto-translated into English from another language

No

[GENERAL] Summarize your solution to the problem (200-character limit including spaces)

We will leverage our 1.7M readers in French and 900k readers in English (total 2.6M) to make Cardano’s community grow thanks to a diverse-topic and engagement-based presence on our media.

[GENERAL] Does your project have any dependencies on other organizations, technical or otherwise?

No

[GENERAL] If YES, please describe what the dependency is and why you believe it is essential for your project’s delivery. If NO, please write “No dependencies.”

No dependencies.

[GENERAL] Will your project’s output/s be fully open source?

No

[GENERAL] Please provide here more information on the open source status of your project outputs

Every article, and other published content will be open source and remain onto our website or socials even after the completion of the Proposal. 

However, the related performances such as views, rankings performances in SEO, or other KPIs that could be used for customer service and satisfaction will not be published (as we do with usual marketing campaigns). It will only be put to disposition to the Catalyst team for quality check and completion check purposes.

[METADATA] Horizons

Learn to Earn

[SOLUTION] Please describe your proposed solution

Cardano is a very interesting ecosystem with singularities that we can’t find anywhere else. It makes no doubt. Sadly, a lot of projects on Cardano are let apart from the traditional crypto media that keep very general topics. 

To help address such a problem, we have the ambition to create different types of content onto our media channels. 

We are owners of 1 big crypto media in FR (around 1.7M unique visitors) and 1 in EN language (900k unique visitors). Our solution is to propose a global marketing campaign running for 4 months into our websites and socials. If this proposal is accepted, we will do a mix of all these formats : 

• News articles to let people know what happens in the ecosystem
• Interview with a figure of Cardano Ecosystem
• Evergreen articles to empower SEO of Cardano’s ecosystem on general crypto topics (these articles will afterwards be gathered in the Read to Earn program to use its gamification to empower more the SEO)
• Read to Earn program to make people learn about Cardano, and engage them through quizzes to earn on-site points (incentivize reading of articles thanks to contests)
• Contests to earn a big amount in ADA for the readers of the Read to Earn (to push engagement from our readers and increase impact of the campaign) 
• Contests to earn a big amount in ADA for our Twitter audience alongside an explanatory Thread 
• Posts on our Twitter, LinkedIn (FR only), Binance Square, Telegram, Facebook (FR only) and Coinmarketcap accounts + share of every article on all these channels
• Coinmarketcap Podcast in FR language 

We capped the campaign to a total of 14 articles (translated in both languages), representing a bit less than 1 per week. These will talk about Cardano wallets, DeFi ecosystem, NFT ecosystem, SPOs, dReps concept and Catalyst, tutorials and academy. Combined with social media activations, contests, other formats and engagements, we think this is the right balance for a 4-month campaign (that’s what we propose to other partners).

[IMPACT] Please define the positive impact your project will have on the wider Cardano community

Even though Cardano is one of the biggest Blockchain solutions out there, a lot of people lack awareness of its ecosystem, how to use it, its specificities, what dApps are usable for which need, and so on. 

In that, we wanted to use our audience to help this ecosystem have a boost of visibility. Thanks to this campaign, Cardano-based projects will obviously be in the light without having to pay for our services by themselves, which is the greatest way Catalyst can use its funds to help the whole Cardano ecosystem to grow. 

To finish in one sentence : we address the challenge by helping to grow the community in providing an exceptional exposure of the Cardano ecosystem to more than 2.6M readers, in a regular manner, and this for 4 months.

[CAPABILITY & FEASIBILITY] What is your capability to deliver your project with high levels of trust and accountability? How do you intend to validate if your approach is feasible?

Since 2019, our media group has been working hard to spread knowledge and information on crypto in FR language, now reaching the biggest community in this language, around 1.7M unique visitors. We launched our EN language in 2023, now gathering more 900k unique visitors. 

Since our beginning, we have had dozens of clients and delivered marketing campaigns for every type of entity from start-ups to big foundations. In that, we confidently affirm that our capacity to deliver the said work with a high quality and in-time is 100%.

[PROJECT MILESTONES] What are the key milestones you need to achieve in order to complete your project successfully?

Please kindly note that every article that is detailed below will be done in both languages. Every article will automatically be shared in our Twitter, LinkedIn (FR only), Binance Square, Telegram, Facebook (FR only) and Coinmarketcap accounts.

Milestone 1 : Month 1

=>Preparation of next milestones : 

• Research and discussion with partners and projects to talk about during our campaign
• Preparation of the SEO expertise and schedule for Evergreen content
• Create the follow-up doc for KPIs and performances

=> Actual start of the campaign : 

• Production and publishment of articles : 

> 2 News articles on Cardano (partnerships, updates, discussions or participations to events…) or Cardano ecosystem’s projects 

> 1 Explained article on Cardano-based project 

• Social media engagement : 

Twitter thread on Cardano’s Governance model with associated contest to win 2500 ADA (duration of 1 month, starting at the end of 1st month and finishing at the end of 2nd one, with the goal of boosting impressions)

Milestone 2 : Month 2 :

=> Preparation of next milestones : 

• Continuing the research to stay relevant in our articles 
• Gather all the material needed for next articles 
• Continuing the gathering of KPIs data and centralization of these informations

=> Continuation of the campaign : 

• Production and publishment of articles : 

> 1 News articles on Cardano or Cardano ecosystem’s projects 

> 3 Evergreen articles (SEO specialized articles to last on Google Search Machine) that will be included in the Read to Earn program further (1 on Cardano’s best features as a blockchain, 1 on the Wallet ecosystem and how to onboard on Cardano with it, 1 on Specific Governance on Cardano and how to participate to it) 

• Social media engagement : 

> Twitter push to engage for the Thread and the contest (mid-term of the contest)

> Twitter announcement of the 10 winners of 250 ADA for the 1st contest

Milestone 3 : Month 3

=> Preparation of next milestones : 

• Continuing the research needed to stay relevant in our articles 
• Continuing the gathering of KPIs data and centralization of these informations

=> Continuation of the campaign : 

• Production and publishment of articles : 

> 1 Explained articles on Cardano-based projects (DeFi, NFT ecosystem, dApps…)

> 3 Evergreen articles (SEO specialized articles to last on Google Search Machine) that will be included in the Read to Earn program further (1 that will be a tutorial on how to onboard to Catalyst, 1 that will explain how SPOs work, 1 that will be a tutorial to delegate to SPOs) 

> Creation of the Read to Earn program, by gathering the 6 Evergreen articles previously published, as well as the associated quizzes 

• Social media engagement : 

> LinkedIn post on the new Read to Earn curriculum

> Binance Square post on the new Read to Earn curriculum

> Twitter post on the new Read to Earn curriculum

> Newsletter to all our Read to Earn registered readers to announce the new Read to Earn curriculum

Milestone 4 : Month 4

=> Preparation of next milestones : 

• Continuing the gathering of KPIs data and centralization of these informations
• Start the report for Catalyst

=> Continuation of the campaign : 

• Production and publishment of articles : 

> 2 Explained articles on Cardano-based projects (DeFi, NFT ecosystem, dApps…) 

> 1 interview with Cardano figure to discuss what are the core differentiation points of Cardano

> Integration of the in-site contest to win 2500 ADA (250 ADA for 10 readers of the Read to Earn program)

• Social media engagement : 

> LinkedIn post on the Read to Earn contest for 2500 ADA

> Binance Square post on the Read to Earn contest for 2500 ADA

> Twitter post on the Read to Earn contest for 2500 ADA

> Newsletter to all our Read to Earn registered readers to announce the Read to Earn contest for 2500 ADA

> Coinmarketcap Podcast with a Cardano Governance Member to discuss the model of it

Final Milestone : Month 5

Close the campaign internally by announcing the 10 winners of the 2500 ADA contest of the Read to Earn program.

Gather all the KPI information on a single doc

Prepare a written short report on our topics with links to every of the 14 articles and their KPI performances.

[RESOURCES] Who is in the project team and what are their roles?

Liâm Bodin will be in charge of the communication with Catalyst coordinators about milestones and advancement of the campaign, managing the administrative docs and smooth running of the campaign, searching for partnerships in the Cardano ecosystem (interview, podcast i.e) and managing the relationship with this community. He will also gather information and redact the final report for the Catalyst team. His LinkedIn here.

He has been in the team since one year, managing offers, proposing details for prestations, managing client relationship, monitoring KPIs, sales management... Also, he’s involved in Catalyst since Fund 10, being LVL 1 and 2 since Fund 11. 

Émile Stantina will be in charge of the campaign schedule planning, coordination of article production and publishment, running podcast, managing social media posts production and publishments. He will also be in charge of KPI sheets fulfillment and follow-up. His LinkedIn here.

Emile has been writing and educating about blockchain and crypto topics since 2016 and joined the team as Chief Content Officer 2 years and a half ago, managing a team of around 15 copywriters. He has been managing KPI monitoring as well, managing client satisfaction and helping them to reach their goals.

[BUDGET & COSTS] Please provide a cost breakdown of the proposed work and resources

Content management : 90000 ADA (around 30000 € at a rate of 0,33 EUR/ADA, average price from 2nd September to 2nd October 2024) 

In this part, we include the remuneration for : 

• Article production from our freelance team in both language for 14 articles per language
• Social media activations production from our team 
• Coordination of the global campaign schedule of publishment of in-site articles and of posts on our socials and other channels 
• SEO expertise in both languages for the creation of the semantic cocoon (needed for the Read to Earn program) 
• Research time on Cardano ecosystem’s projects to be diverse in our topics and cover a larger part of the ecosystem 
• Coordination with the Catalyst team and Cardano ecosystem partners to ensure the good running of the campaign
• KPI monitoring and report co-preparation 
• Margin for the media group 

Contests to engage our community : 2*2500 ADA = 5000 ADA

Here we include money for giveaways to our community. With that, we intend to increase the reach of the campaign and the comprehension of the Cardano ecosystem.

[VALUE FOR MONEY] How does the cost of the project represent value for money for the Cardano ecosystem?

The cost of our project represents a huge value to the ecosystem as it brings a huge visibility to the Cardano ecosystem and its projects. The pricing is the same as what we propose to usual partners for a 4-month global support in both languages. 

We think that a regular exposure to more than 2.6M readers is a great way to have people interested in solutions that are available in the ecosystem of Cardano. 

It has the potential to bring new users, delegators to SPO, more transactions on DeFi protocols and on this ecosystem in general. It has the potential to contribute to a growth in Cardano’s global community, notably by promoting different faces of the ecosystem.