Lessons from SENSHI for NFT pre-launch growth

SENSHI is an upcoming generative 3D NFT collection of 5,555 pieces. Whilst at the time of writing little is known about the project, including the alluded metaverse utility, one thing that is apparent is the team knows how to market. With 5 days left until launch they've managed to gain 155K followers on Twitter with verified status as well as over 16K on Discord.

In this Lesson From we'll take a look at some of the things Jacko (@JackoMCR) & Strizzy (@StrizzyLDN) have done to get to this point.

1. Before launching hype is your only product

The first thing to note about SENSHI's journey so far is the distinct absence of any 'tangible' product. As of writing they haven't launched their website, nor have they released a roadmap (despite hinting at dropping one). Yet when scrolling their timeline it becomes obvious this doesn't matter, as the FOMO they've built is palpable.

The way they did this was through both simultaneously building a sense of earliness to something big, as well as restricting the access to this early group to introduce scarcity. Some examples of these tactics:

• Open Discord server access only once a follower count has been hit
• Limit the number of Discord members to 10% of that follower count
• Introduce the idea of 'OG Spots' on top of whitelists in the community
• Post collection piece previews based on hitting engagement targets for a post e.g. retweets

Another tactic that works especially well for 3D projects is the release of collection piece previews that have been obscured, in the case of SENSHI by darkening the model lighting. In the current NFT space, due to the higher barriers to entry, 3D projects already have a heightened impact factor, and combined with this obscured presentation the whole thing creates a cinematic feel that reels investors in.

SENSHI teaser model

Other tactics include competitions which we'll discuss later.

Lesson: Less product is more when it comes to building anticipation through scarcity.

2. Build credibility through social proof

One thing that stands out for SENSHI is the engagement of their first post, a whitelist (WL) retweet competition that achieved a very respectable 2K+ engagement for just 200 WL spots. I'm unsure what the exact reason for this was, but this could have been done a number of ways including existing networks with key members of the NFT community, promotions on other social media platforms and/or paid promotion. Regardless of the cause, SENSHI came out of the gates with a lot of momentum and continued to build on it with strong social proof. Just over two weeks after that first tweet they began a campaign of partnering with other projects to do shared giveaways of WL spots. They've done this with a diverse group of seemingly tangential projects, including P2E games, luxury Web3 fashion brands, metaverse lands and PFPs. These choices may become more related after the project releases more details, but even if not the tactic of appealing to a wide range of investors is smart. Another tactic used was to give WL spots to current holders of blue chip projects such as BAYC, MoonBirds etc. I found this interesting as whilst the collaboration is permissionless with respect to the projects, it still requires buy in (permission) from the individual holders, making the tactic more powerful than the original of just sending assets to a wallet as a false-flag of credibility.

Another way they built credibility through collaboration, which I believe is still one of the most underutilised, was by advertising the project within the 'real' world. As one of their more impressive RT competitions they hired a billboard in NYC Times Square and asked followers to send a photo of themselves in front of it. These tactics of mainstream credibility are powerful when used correctly (and even when less so), as even if they have a low conversion rate of mainstream audiences, the idea of mainstream buy in for a project by crypto investors remains at this time one of the most powerful.

Lesson: Use both permissioned and permissionless collaborations with projects to build credibility

3. Drive momentum using competitions

This is one of the oldest tricks in the book, but whereas lesser Twitter timelines can look stale with the same old competition tweets, SENSHI has managed to keep theirs fresh with variety. The first thing to vary is the competition reward, with SENSHI using WL spots, Discord invites and collection reveals as prizes for engagement. Next, they've varied both the content of their competitions as well as how they want users to engage with said content. I've listed some of the most creative they've used, as well as the most effective time to use them over the course of building your audience:

• Pick a number competition [Early]

Followers try to pick a number for the chance at a WL spot. No one guessed correctly? Do another and pick some of the closest.

• Most replies competition [Middle]

Self-explanatory but highly effective once a decently sized audience has been built. Can be varied by using a specific reply to the tweet such as 'GM' - bonus points if you align the content of the replies with a topic/keyword that is trending.

• Least liked response competition [Middle/Late]

This one only works once you've built an engaged audience, but gaming engagement between followers is kind of genius. You also game the Twitter also as it promotes content that multiple people you follow have liked, leading to further social proof.

• ASCII art [Early]

This one caught my eye immediately, which is the second half of the plan when trying to get content onto potential follower timelines. You could improve even further by integrating the visual identity/theme of the project into the art.

• Times Square billboard photo competition [Late]

As mentioned previously, using 'real' world methods can be powerful. This particular strategy also helps if you're targeting a particular geography, but simply due to that reason this will only work once you have a wide enough following to assume you have a base there.

• Collection piece interaction competitions [Early]

This is pretty standard, but what I liked about SENSHI's collection piece tweets were how they contextualised the copy with respect to the piece. It's simple but breaks the monotony of generic copy, and when you don't have much of the product released it's crucial you insert your brand narrative every chance you get.

ASCII Art Tweet

Something that may surprise founders to see is the relative sparsity of these tweets. At one point SENSHI took a 2 week hiatus, and tweet competitons were being ran at a rate of 1-2 a day. This stands in contrast to a lot of projects that use a volume approach of tweeting multiple times a day, subsequently splitting their engagement per tweet.

Lesson: Bootstrap your momentum through effective engagement rather than volume

Overall there's already quite a lot to learn from SENSHI in their pre-launch run up which hopefully translates into success for the team.