Once you're done with this, check out our guide on Web3 go-to-market tactics and strategies. With the term creator now widely recognized, the creator economy market has reached an outstanding $104.2 billion. 2021 was a pivotal year for the sector as Web3 took all sectors by storm. Ledger, also French, makes digital assets more secure with their crypto hardware wallet. Digital creatives have always recognized that they must be nimble to succeed. This runs counter to decentralization and the principles of Web3 and harms the value of the creation as it depends on the platform where it was issued. The rise of blockchain technology and cryptocurrency propelled the NFT market into the limelight. to retain greater control over their work, monetize it, and collaborate with others. In this post, I dive into what play to earn is, case studies on Axie Infinity and STEPN, and how web3 gaming might become sustainable. Manage your clients funds, all in one place. To make matters worse, platforms today take too big a share of the income creators generate. Speedinvest fundamentally believes that Web3 is a technology that will redefine all verticals in the economy. By combining virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR), the digital world is evolving beyond games and marketing campaigns into an entire world with digital avatars, virtual goods, and completely new experiences. This led to a power imbalance between platforms and creators in Web2. Founded in 2018, DEIP has been funded by private investors, over a dozen venture capitalist firms, and business angels which include the co-founder of EPAM Systems and the CEO of Bitcoin.com. Take singer Dua Lipa, who broke paid livestreaming records with 2020s Studio 2054 concert. Today, investors typically believe / expect 'crypto-native teams to have a better position to build and win in this space over teams building social / consumer/ game-first startups. come for the tool), Web3 companies should have more of a bottom-up approach and design the tokenomics to reach and attract an engaged community. Oops! Therefore, what this means in practice is that, while Web2 businesses GTM strategies start with the product (i.e. The aim of this list is neither to be exhaustive nor to rank startups, but rather to chart the rapidly evolving and expanding creator economy startup ecosystem. The underlying blockchain technology acts as a sort of underwriting for the creators, protecting the ownership of the content and allowing them to focus on their creativity. The same tendency helps NFTs bring value to the ownership of content. With the help of these contracts, every interaction between content creators and their clients will automatically be recorded. The same research also states that one billion people will self-identify as a creator over the next five years. Creative industries are set to become the major driver of economic growth as more value is assigned to intangible assets such as intellectual property. Community tokens - that are issued based on our contributions - may just enable many of us to have an additional means of income in the future - creating a new generation of wealth.. It refers to a new financial system comprised mostly of independent creators (artists and influencers) who no longer depend on traditional modes for funding i.e., big corporations, media houses, and agencies as they have been able to generate finances by reaching out directly to their audience. - as our goal is to focus on and support the startup market. They can now clearly see which way the wind is blowing when it comes to the creator economy and they want in. We are excited about the untapped potential of the new Web3 creator platforms and creators tools that enable these new direct creator-community relationships and that are built for the mainstream consumer, unlocking the next 100 million users in Web3. Being a creator is enormously hard. This will result in providing a pathway to asset ownership in individual creator economies outside of traditional centralized platforms. But despite these developments, most creators face the same problems theyve faced for years: Creators are still not fully compensated for their efforts, making it very difficult for them to build a stable income. Danielle Lay, Investor at NEA, says, "Creators can move from fee based compensation to building wealth through equity in the communities they build. Jarrod Dicker, Partner at TCG, comments, "What Web3 really does is it unlocks the possibility for creators to offer more. Dear subscribers, Lets talk about what its actually like to build a DAO (decentralized autonomous organization) from scratch. It is a truly horizontal trend investors are paying close attention to across the board. Out of 144 companies, only 18 are based in Europe. Sasha Kaletsky, Co-Founder of Creator Collective Capital, says, In addition, today, some of the most successful NFT-based games (e.g., Axie Infinity, Sorare) have a strong pay-to-win element, which is culturally quite out of sync with the Western free-to-play culture of recent years. The global pandemic changed everything for creators: The stay-at-home orders accelerated the shift toward blockchain and Web3 advancement. After two years and many COVID-19 restrictions finally subsiding, the world is welcoming the return of in-person theater, movies, comedy, music and sports. The content itself will be embedded within its code, so copying or reposting content will be significantly more difficult. This site requires JavaScript to run correctly. This sometimes leads to creators working insanely hard for not a huge amount of upside - it is important we take care of ourselves.. Web3 technologies allow creating of a new set of rules which democratize access to resources for creators, shifting the creator economy towards a new model where the focus moves to value creation to unlock the full potential of intellectual assets. The stage has been set for a blossoming of creative activity, and those poised to take it will be assisted by decentralized infrastructure. In order for a currency to store value, people need to trust it, inflation needs to be watched, and the goods / services that a consumer can receive in exchange for the currency needs to be valuable to the user.". While tools like Moby and Icy.tools may be used to track specific NFT projects. 77% of creators rely on brand deals for the majority of their income, but brand deals can vary month to month. Web3 shows promise for all industries in some form or another, but what does it have in store for the creator economy? The term creator economy is rather new in the modern economic lingo. Its about new forms of direct creator-community relationships. As a result, platforms are moving fast to build an increasingly multifaceted offering of opportunities. That is where the eyeballs are - wherever the creators are and so as a creator it's a very exciting time!, Adoption hurdle. Government-imposed restrictions may have accelerated the pace of change, but the transformative trends in video streaming we witnessed during the pandemic were nascent before and would have caught hold regardless. Join 20,000+ others who get my thoughts about creators, communities, and web3 in as few words as possible, no more than twice a month. If we look at the European Web3 creator companies and tools in our mapping, broken down into their respective categories, we have identified the below companies: Check out the entire list below, including information about their category, stage and location. I am most excited about platforms that enable creators to create meaningful engagement with their audience without having to be on an endless content hamster wheel. This often results in limited revenue opportunities, such as merchandise, subscriptions, ad revenue or tipping which unfortunately are, in practice, only sustainable for the top 1% of creators who have amassed large followings. Silvia Oviedo Lopez, Head of Marketplace at Canva, says, I think that the community angle is going to be the most interesting [part] over the next little while and really brings a new lens to the creator economy. Join 20,000+ others who get my thoughts about creators, crypto, and tech in as few words as possible, once or twice a month. Such promise of transparency and authenticity of ownership along with the openness and flexibility to monetize art is unlike anything experienced by creators before, especially given that it applies to both digital and physical assets. No Intermediaries: The NFT space is one that can ensure better profits as it cuts out intermediaries, helping creators earn better for every single creation. Developers, eager to seize a piece of this market without being crushed by high costs, are increasingly seeking blockchain-based affordable infrastructure to support creator streams. Sustainability and longevity are another huge pain point. In this instance, investors would probably like to see founders who are native enough to understand crypto and Web3 with a lot of depth and nuances, who have the right network to attract crypto engineers, but who also so native that they cant understand the experience of the average mainstream, non-crypto user they might be talking to. Speedinvest is supported by InnovFin Equity, with the financial backing of the European Union under Horizon 2020 Financial Instruments and the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI) set up under the Investment Plan for Europe. This shift is a massive opportunity for web3 companies, The creator lean canvas is a framework that gives you one place to answer the most important questions about your creator business.If youre a creator, is web3 a solution seeking a problem or can it meaningfully improve the world? Related: The Metaverse will change the live music experience, but will it be decentralized? It's a cliched thing to say but it is 100% true. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision. Soon these creators started monetizing their audiences, primarily through affiliate advertising and sponsorship agreements - allowing them to become channels for other brands and earn revenue in the process. This includes the likes of Andreessen Horowitz, Greylock, Bessemer, Northzone and Atomico. Web3 is enabling the financialization of everything, with the theme of ownership at its core. Examples of metrics to quantify the quality of the engagement and health of a network are: Monthly Active Wallets: Unique users with active token wallets last month. Zero balance addresses are those that have transferred out all their tokens. The non-fungibility of these tokens is what renders them unique, just like a Monet or Van Gogh. Thank you for reading our piece and we hope you have enjoyed it. Finally, we turned to the main actors in this new iteration of the space and asked a few creators what they are most excited about and what challenges they may face in the future - and here are their answers: Deeper and longer-lasting relationships - across platforms. Web3 is something some creators are aware of, but few know exactly where and how to take action and what it actually means for them., A long way to go for the middle class of creators. For updates and exclusive offers enter your email. You can now earn money by playing a game (e.g., Axie Infinity, Sorare) and, by doing so, you are now making a decision with your time. The real benefits of NFTs rarely make it to the front page due to the glitz and glamour of celebrity engagement and sky-high biddings. Caspar Lee (Creator, Influencer.com, Creator Collective Capital), Blake Michael (Creator), Bremner Morris (Rally.io), Sarah Nckel (Northzone, Femstreet), Niko Bonatsos (General Catalyst), Sasha Kaletsky (Creator Collective Capital), Jim Shepherd (Snapchat), Max Fosh (YouTube Creator), Rex Woodbury (Index Ventures), Nicole Quinn (Lightspeed Ventures), Tim Draper (Draper Associates), Sandy Lin (TikTok Creator), Meagan Loyst (Lerer Hippeau), Ann Miura-Ko (Floodgate Ventures), Danielle Lay (NEA), Michael Sidgmore (Broadhaven Ventures), Kieran Hill (20VC), Harry Stebbings (20VC), Sameer Singh (Network effects Advisor and Atomico Angel), Mattia Mrvosevic (Eterna Capital), Jarrod Dicker (TCG), Brandon Potts (Framework Ventures), Robby Yung (Animoca Brands), Bradford Stephens (Blockchain Capital), Courtney Chow (Battery Ventures), Jade Darmawangsa (Creator), Dominik Tobshall (Speedinvest), Sam Nasser Zare (SoftBank). Utility NFTs or NFTs 2.0 are NFTs with valuations that are based on the access, perks, and opportunities they provide to the token holder. Now, there is a technology that will empower them and their analog peers to reach new audiences on their own terms without having to cede power or profit to tech behemoths like Google and Amazon. Thats what investors would want to see. What is the best crypto casino in July 2022? Today, the definition of creator has been changing with the rise of Web3 as power dynamics shift from the platforms to the creators and their communities. Kobo Says Two-Thirds of Crypto Hedge Funds Will Fail, Flare Celebrates Genesis Event With Open Invitation to Blockchain Devs. For creatives like musicians or NFT creators, royalties will also be included in smart contracts. If we take blockchain-based games and in-game NFTs as an example, game developers in Web3 not only have to worry about building a good game, but also about creating good enough financial incentives to support a robust and sustainable in-game economy. Nobody wants angry fans whove lost money blowing up their comments (its happened before)! adds Sasha. Based on user demand, utility NFTs are believed to be the future and, therefore, founders need to understand how to best design them. Learn more about the Speedinvest Marketplaces & Consumer team and sign up for our newsletter to get our exclusive content delivered straight to your inbox. Web1 refers to the first, static version of the web, also called The Information Economy. So much of the current disruption within this new creator economy is in the distribution mechanism where you create and capture value and then redirect it to the core community, your earliest supporters, in acknowledgement of the value that they provide. Creators are no longer just the product - they are the new economies. In the second bucket are ways that people find an audience online; the best technologies enable better community formation. Related: Decentralization revolutionizes the creators economy, but what will it bring? Based on the conditions that are predefined in smart contracts, like if/then clauses, payments will be released automatically with the clients approval. These centralized providers will increasingly find themselves on the defensive. Speedinvest fundamentally believes that Web3 is a technology that will redefine all verticals in the economy. While in Web2 the primary GTM stakeholder is the customer. Bradford Stephens, Co-founder & Managing Partner at Blockchain Capital, says, This is a movement that is coming from the people. The pandemic boosted this kind of creator economy, bringing forth many new creators. They can initiate payments to whoever is involved in the creative work like composer, performer, editor, etc, in the music field. The number of active wallets also rose 151.89% at around the same time signifying more potential buyers and thus more sale prospects for NFT creators. It removes intermediaries from traditional Web2 aggregators and gatekeepers, which is key for the democratization of income creation in the digital world.". Creators are attracted to unique Web3 features such as tipping, paid entry, and live shopping to monetize their content. Creatives can send invoices with due dates set for a pre-defined period. An example is YouTubers and TikTokers creating content for their fans. The rise in creative energy has inspired the developer community as well. Immersive interactivity - The nature of Web2 publishing is already providing immersive interactivity and rewards users for participation, and the development of Web3 space will accelerate this further. Coming soon: Diving deeper into Go-to-Market Tactics and Strategies in Web3 #watchthespace. As several NFT platforms are now entering the market, creators are exploring opportunities that never existed before. Im excited to see how things shape up!. The enforced slowdown has given many artists the time and the push needed to experiment in the digital sphere, find new audiences and explore new ways to showcase their talents. Here's how a few greedy players (LUNA, 3AC, and Celsius) screwed millions of retail investors. 5 BTC + 300 Free Spins for new players & 15 BTC + 35.000 Free Spins every month, only at mBitcasino. The companys technology has an interoperability feature that allows creators to remove their asset from DEIP and transfer it to other protocols and markets. Visit our. He continues, We are so excited to see how the space evolves over the next few years in all aspects from gaming companies where you no longer need to buy multiple avatars in games. The financialization of everything. Additionally, token gating provides unique experiences for fans such as giving access to private communities and direct messaging with creators. This is the technology that will completely reshape digital life, supercharging the creator economy in the process. It stands for community, brand and ownership.. The creator economy is no longer just about providing value to the platforms. Smart contracts in blockchain will redefine art ownership. By providing a more equitable environment that enables creators to earn a fair share of their work, Web3 technologies such as DEIP allow creators from across the spectrum (art, music, scientific research, blogs, etc.) Weve reached out to the wider ecosystem to provide you with a clearer overview of who is investing in this space, including their stage, geography focus and cheque sizes. However, we believe everyone will be a creator eventually in some capacity, says Ollie Forsyth, Global Community Manager at Antler. The global crypto market has lost $1.2 trillion dollars since April 2022 and multiple crypto companies are facing bankruptcy. My faith in the ability of musicians, gamers, influencers and creators to adapt to the new realities to come and to thrive in them has never been stronger. We remain incredibly excited about how the future of the internet evolves and we remain deeply passionate about supporting the next generation of platforms. But this growth in the creator economy is also driven by record amounts of funding pouring into the market from prominent investors - $1.3 billion in 2021 alone. For this reason, we decided to ask a few investors for their thoughts on what they pay attention to when analyzing potential investments in the space. The Creator Earnings, Benchmark Report 2021 highlights that nearly 50 million people have joined the creator economy bringing the total creator economy market size close to USD 104.2 billion, a figure that could touch the trillion-dollar mark by 2023. But how? And, Facebook suffered colossal reputational damage from a lengthy outage and whistleblower claims that its management has repeatedly chosen to prioritize profit over safety. And the last bucket contains ways that creators can make money. Niche down: While Web2 was built to scale up, Web3 is built to niche down. From Term Sheet to Closing: A Founders Guide to Ace Your Financing Round, Why Your Startup Needs a Community Manager (and How to Use Them), We Need to Go Deeper: Crypto at Speedinvest. The most crypto-native founders are not necessarily the right ones to build some of these new creator solutions which, depending on where you sit on the landscape, actually mostly resemble consumer apps. Investors look for volumes at launch (transaction volume and trade volume, payments volume, search volume, developer activity, # of wallets transacting on-chain, # of mints, etc.). Niche down - While Web2 was known for scaling up, Web3 will be known for niching down. DEIP aims to eliminate publisher lock-in, whereby a centralized entity can hold creators to ransom with unfair conditions and make it difficult to take their intellectual assets elsewhere. The Web3 revolution aims to disrupt the current Web2 phase controlled by centralized entities and tech companies like Google, Facebook, Netflix, Amazon, etc. The creator economy stands at an inflexion point, as content creators are moving beyond simply working with brands and evolving their businesses by adding numerous revenue streams. Zero balance addresses / total addresses = Zero balance ratio. What's exciting is this self empowerment of the individual, and that is the life-changing and major shift in humanity!. EarthFund Launches Carbon Removal DAO, A Community-Led Project Fighting Climate Change, Why Bridging the DeFi Interoperability Gap Will be the Ultimate Game Changer in DEX Trading, Hot Cryptocurrencies Right Now | Trending Tokens in 2022, One of the Prominent Crypto News Sites Sponsors Newly Launched Gaming Platform BitSpinCasino, Annexs O.D. If we take newsletters as an example, the concept in Web3 becomes 'why subscribe when you can invest?' With ample media attention and celebrity power added to that, we are now at the inception of a potent new market. The fungibility of a token, as a distribution mechanism, is the disruptive aspect luring in new founders and creators and exactly how they experiment with this distribution and add additional utility layers is what excites me most as this is where original ideas flourish. In our interview, Jason covers his journey to web3 and, Gibson Biddle's "Ask Gib" Product Newsletter. This same technology makes content creation a very meritocratic system and that is exciting for everybody. The development of Web3 technologies such as smart contracts and virtual reality is further transforming the creator economy, changing how creators produce content, claim ownership, and get paid for their work. But it is platforms that allow creators to make an income from doing what they love. To stay in keeping with decentralized and shared governance, DEIP is launching its first public sale to auction off just over 5% of the company. However, as platforms improve discovery and creators become more accustomed to owning their financial relationships with fans, the middle class of creators are set to be rewarded as well., Sustainability and longevity. Our primary sources of data were Crunchbase and Pitchbook, supplemented by our own deal flow, as well as conversations with investors from other VCs. Within the creator world, I am most excited about the metaverse direction we are all walking towards. This is, we believe, where the next iteration of the category is headed towards. The creator economy is made up of 50 million people creating intellectual assets of all types. This website uses cookies. While the validity of this perspective can be argued, nonetheless, it has consistently helped to spur innovation, with the country being at the heart of multiple tech booms and home to a relatively high percentage of early-adopter consumers. With their new ability to draw global audiences through on-demand access-anywhere streams, creators are turning to uniquely Web3 features such as tipping, paid entry and live shopping to monetize their content. As this space continues to unfold, we will see new avenues of content creation. Web3 is a mash up of 3D worlds, social gaming, NFTs, and virtual goods ownership. Artificial intelligence and machine learning will help creators in finding images, texts, and videos more quickly. Read our comprehensive comparison! The creator economy? a mix of push marketing versus collaborations). Two attention-grabbing incidents in 2021 are illustrative: Hackers attacked Twitch and released private information about its code and its users to the world. With interest in the metaverse, cryptocurrency, and digital collectibles growing by the day, NFTs offers a befitting space for new-age creators that benefits not only them but the collectors as well. Just as the blockchain enables fans to engage directly with their favorite creators, it offers a pathway to asset ownership in individual creator economies outside of traditional centralized platforms. Consumers are increasingly moving online, pouring their attention and $$ into mobile as we head into a mobile-first economy. I strongly believe it is. Harry Stebbings, Founder of The Twenty Minute VC and 20VC fund, says, "Seeing more value captured by users, both individually and collectively, is one of the most exciting aspects of Web3. Thats a fundamental shift that not only puts creators in control but also makes communities less appealing to attention-seeking trolls. Buy gift cards/mobile Top Ups with Cryptos, Bitcoin Casinos Where, What and How to Play. The users role was mainly limited to reading information provided by very few content producers with no option for the users to circle back to those creators. A survey from Middlesex University and funded by the UK Economic and Social Research Council showed that some 90% of musicians and 92% of fans believe livestreaming would remain an effective way to reach fans unwilling or unable to travel to venues in the post-pandemic world. You can just have a handful that can be played on multiple platforms. There is still a long way to go for the growing middle class of creators the top echelon of creators is earning the majority of the revenue generated in the creator economy. ", The Metaverse. Blockchains are already starting to operate the backends of many software applications and, as part of Web3, have more potential to influence how we interact with the internet than mobile and the cloud did., New tools bridging Web2 engagement with Web3 loyalty. To understand what kind of liquidity there is in the market, it is particularly important to consider the exchange trade volume.