The rise of the internet, e-commerce, and social media each transformed the way brands and enterprises market their products, conduct business, and cultivate engaged audiences. With the new rise of Web3, blockchain technology, and NFTs, we are seeing a new transformation–an evolution of engagement focused on the most essential part of any brand or company: customers, fans, and employees.
NFT campaigns have allowed brands to reach new heights of engagement while empowering the most important stakeholders. Through Art, Storytelling, and Gamification, NFT campaigns deliver meaningful experiences to community members, driving new levels of success for the brands and businesses behind them.
Learn how 6 brands engaged their fans with 10 different use cases for NFTs:
Coach — Commemorating a Brand Anniversary and Increasing Loyalty Program Signups
To celebrate their 80th anniversary, Coach partnered with VaynerMedia and NFT.Kred to launch Coach’s first NFT collection. Coach gave away 80 free NFTs via daily drops over 8 days.
The collection featured 8 beloved characters from Snow City, Coach’s holiday 2021 game. Each character was crafted into an animated digital collectible NFT and was redeemable for a made-to-order, completely customizable Rogue bag in 2022.
Coach's Snow City NFT Marketplace
Each drop sold out in under 1 minute.
Loyal fans were ecstatic to receive their Coach NFTs, and blown away by the redeemable utility allowing them to receive a free and customized Rogue bag. Those that did not wish to redeem the NFT for a Rogue bag were able to sell the NFTs to other Coach fans for thousands of dollars resulting in more happy fans and royalties from those sales getting sent back to Coach.
Learn more about Coach’s first NFT campaign.
For their second NFT experience, Coach planned to release an NFT collection with the goal of increasing sign-ups for their Coach Insider Program. They decided to do this during NFT.NYC. Renee Klein, VP of Digital Strategy, presented on the Brands Track during the conference describing their first NFT launch and announced their latest NFT drop that went live shortly after her onstage appearance.
For this NFT release, they partnered with the well-known digital artist Shxpir, whose style is very authentic as it relates to Coach’s brand. Fiercely independent and always unique, Shxpir is an artist and photographer based in New York who has worked with leading luxury houses across the world’s fashion capitals.
30 minutes after Klein’s presentation about their first NFT campaign, the Insider Program NFTs were released. Coach was founded in 1941 and as a nod to their history, only 1941 NFTs were minted. Fans of the Coach brand were made aware of this release via email and social media. The campaign was very well received as all of the NFTs sold out in minutes.
Coach Insider Members were rewarded exclusive access to claim the Coach x SHXPIR NFTs first before the public. Those who were not Insiders prior to the NFT drop could sign up and gain special access to this exclusive NFT as well in the public release. The goal for this campaign was to incentivize others to become part of the Coach Insider Community.
Learn more about Coach’s second NFT campaign.
PwC — Gamify Education and Event/Conference Participation
PwC introduced their first NFT release in a white-label, branded marketplace for their Emerging Tech Exchange event in 2022. The event was designed for executives leading major transformation initiatives across their organizations. They heard from peers who have navigated these challenges at scale and with sustained success. Executives came away with an expanded network, as well as business and technology solutions that can make their organizations more competitive.
The goal was for PwC to provide attendees with valuable and educational experiences with NFTs through hands-on activities. These NFT activations will also aid in establishing PwC as the knowledge source around NFTs and smart contract technology for attendees during and after the event.
PwC engaged event attendees with 5 different kinds of NFTs:
- Early Bird Registration — Incentivized Registration Prior to Arrival
- Set Completion Scavenger Hunt — Gamification
- Custom Avatars — Digital Identity
- Digital Trophies
- Proof of Attendance — You Never Forget Your First NFT
PwC's Digital Identity NFT
Overall, PwC was able to curate a brand experience and drive traffic to their own white-label NFT website. They provided collectors and visitors a seamless and curated experience when claiming the commemorative NFTs.
Learn more about PwC’s NFT campaign.
NIVEA — Engage Fans with Valuable Messaging
NIVEA launched their first NFT with “The Value of Touch” a campaign developed by NIVEA’s global agency partner Publicis One Touch. The NFT campaign launched in December 2021 and all 15,000 free NFTs were claimed in 48 hours.
NIVEA’s “The Value of Touch” NFT campaign invites you to “see the world the way you feel it.” They highlight the story of Clarissa Baldassarri, a visual artist who experienced a temporary loss of sight at the start of her career, sending her on a journey to discover how valuable touch can be.
With “The Value of Touch” art, NIVEA wants to bring attention to the power of human touch, using NFTs to discuss the value society currently attributes to it, and to spark a conversation about how touch can be valuable and powerful, even if freely available to all.
As all 15,000 NFTs were claimed within 48 hours, NIVEA’s first NFT launch was a huge success. Other companies across industries took notice, as did the NFT community and NIVEA’s most loyal customers.
Learn more about NIVEA’s “The Value of Touch” NFT campaign.
SAP — Share Verifiable Credentials and Awards Across Team Members and Employees
In early 2022, SAP SuccessFactors was awarded SAP’s first ever Line of Business of the Year Award. Nicolle Sternberger, Global Head of Go-to-Market (GTM) Success Factors for SAP, was looking for a way to award each member of the internal team who was responsible for the Line of Business of the Year Award. The decision was made to create NFTs to commemorate this team achievement with verifiable proof that showcases the collaborative and innovative spirit of their team.
The decision was made to partner with NFT.KRED, a white-label NFT marketplace service provider and the producer of the NFT industry’s premier event, NFT.NYC. One of the main goals of this campaign was to make it as simple and user-friendly as possible. They directed their employees to their branded NFT platform website. Employees were then asked to sign up with their work email address and simply click on “Claim Award NFT”.
Once the NFT was claimed by the winning SAP SuccessFactors team, it could be used as a credential integrated on LinkedIn to recognize their contribution to the prestigious Line of Business award. These NFTs show ownership on the blockchain and therefore become a verifiable credential from SAP. With the help of an email marketing tool and an integration with LinkedIn, employees received an email and with one click attached their NFT to their LinkedIn profile.
Learn more and SAP’s NFT Campaign.
Tom Felton — Engaging with Fans and Raising Money For Charity
English actor Tom Felton, best known for his role as Draco Malfoy in the Harry Potter film series, is leading the way in his philanthropic NFTs pursuits. Felton’s fan engagement model simultaneously acknowledges the creators of his fan art, rewards top fans with limited edition, officially endorsed NFTs and raises awareness and funding for good causes.
Tom is using NFTs as a tool to support artists while raising money for charities. Powered by NFT.Kred, the FeltonFanArt platform focuses on simplifying the NFT collector experience for mainstream fans while leveraging awareness and the scope of his community to support good causes.
NFTs are useful for philanthropy because they can deliver high visibility to charities, engage communities, and be customized to fit individual philanthropic goals.
NFTs incentivize philanthropy among celebrities and public figures because they help them to grow their own brands and do work that aligns with their passions while also giving back.
After going live, Tom received an overwhelming response from fans on both his NFT Gallery and social channels.
Thousands of NFTs have been claimed for free by fans. This fan art NFT selected by Tom was claimed by over 500 people for free and received over 800 likes and over 400 comments.
The Felton Fan Art Gallery remains open to fan art submissions. To date, there have been 500+ fan art submissions. Rather than just engaging with Tom’s content via likes and comments on his Twitter and Instagram, fans are engaging with the artworks directly on Tom’s Fan Art Domain.
Learn more about the FeltonFanArt platform.
NFT.NYC 2022 — Leveraging 4 NFT Types to Engage Attendees and Speakers
Since 2018, NFT.Kred has helped Brands launch tightly integrated NFT experiences on their own domains, using its no-code white-label platform and deep set of APIs. NFT.Kred started NFT.NYC in 2019, which has become the industry-leading event and has grown from 460 to over 16,000 attendees in 4 years.
NFT.NYC is not your typical conference — the focus is on the NFT community and technology. The event curates various NFT experiences throughout the week to give attendees the opportunity to engage and interact with the technology.
Below are several of the NFT tech activations that NFT.NYC implements to enhance the conference experience each year for attendees, speakers, and sponsors.
NFT Swag — From Physical to Digital
Free NFT Swag and Merch NFTs were made available to all attendees. These NFTs could be redeemed to gain entry to an event, receive physical merchandise, or even get a free drink. All Swag NFTs made available in 2022 were claimed.
Sponsors are able to amplify their message beyond typical branding and signage. In lieu of physical “swag bags”, providing NFTs gives attendees an enhanced, digital experience.
Digital NFT swag bags offer a unique experience for event partners to engage with attendees during the event, and also allows for re-engagement post-event. For example, Sponsors can surprise and delight NFT owners after the event by making the NFT redeemable for perks year-round.
Networking with Speaker NFT Cards
Each NFT.NYC speaker was sent a personalized, commemorative NFT to celebrate their participation as a speaker. 10 additional Speaker Card NFTs were also made available for attendees to collect and support the speakers they enjoyed the most. The NFTs were minted on Polygon and were claimed within the first few hours.
All original Speaker Card NFTs came with a very useful utility. Speakers could add their status as a 2022 NFT.NYC Speaker to their Linkedin profile via a unique link that verified their NFT as an official credential on LinkedIn. Validating one’s participation to their network with an NFT enhances transparency and can strengthen trust within a community.
NFT Awards — Recognizing Top Creators and Builders
The 2nd annual NFT.NYC Awards were presented to top artists, brands, blockchains, and projects in 56 different categories. Nominations were accepted via Twitter Polls and voting took place with HubSpot forms.
Winners were decided by the community, with over 18,000 total votes submitted. The awards were co-hosted by OpenSea, APENFT, Livepeer, and Tron. Physical awards were provided by Infinite Objects.
Extraordinary NFT Artists
NFT.NYC wanted to engage with the NFT artist community by collaborating on a special showcase offering. Over 1,500 artist applications were received and 221 artists were selected to participate. 62% of the artists were from the United States, with the remaining 38% residing in 16 other countries.
Artists had the choice to create 10 or 20 editions of their unique designs. 75% of primary sales went to the artist and 25% to NFT.NYC. NFT.NYC used these funds to advertise the Artist Showcase Collection across billboards in Times Square during the event.
Disclaimer: Our owners, writers, and/or guest post authors may or may not have a vested interest in any of the above projects and businesses. None of the content on this blog is investment advice nor is it a replacement for advice from a certified financial planner.
