October 24, 2024

How to Empower your WEB3 Products with Community-Driven Growth Marketing: Custom Smart Bundles

During my time at Cake Group, one of my proudest projects was enhancing Bake’s existing product—Smart Bundles—by adding a unique, community-driven twist that made it stand out in the crypto space. Smart Bundles were already a fantastic offering, essentially functioning as mini crypto ETFs that allowed users to invest in a bundle of assets related to a specific narrative. For example, bundles could include the top five AI coins or the leading GameFi projects by market cap. Additionally, these bundles made it ultra-convenient for users to earn auto-compounded APY on the assets inside without the need for self-custody wallets, pool delegation, or manual staking, making it a speedy get-and-forget solution for hodlers.

For all Zelda fans, we created a social media clip that explains it in a nutshell:

The original concept, as explained in the in-app video above was strong: Bake provided users the expertise of curated bundles, making it easy to invest in trending narratives with just a few taps. Our editorial team delivered in-depth research and analysis for the investment strategy and opportunities for each new Smart Bundle launched on Bake. These insights were shared via email marketing, in-app notifications, and SEO-optimized articles on Bake’s Blog, providing users with valuable information to inspire and make informed decisions.

But there was this great opportunity to go further. Why not extend the power of creating bundles to the community itself? Let them have a hand in crafting the narratives and share their own expertise. That’s how Bake’s Custom Smart Bundles came to life, fostering community-driven engagement and enabling organic growth through user-generated narratives and shared expertise.

What Are Custom Smart Bundles?

Bake’s Custom Smart Bundles allow users to create, manage, and market their own personalized bundles. It’s designed for everyone—from novice traders to experienced investors—to simplify their investment process while also enhancing engagement through customization.

With Custom Smart Bundles, users could select the assets they believed in, define their proportions, and build something that wasn’t just a portfolio—it was their strategy, their narrative, and their brand. It empowered crypto enthusiasts, influencers, and new users alike, allowing them to participate in a more active, strategic way. This feature gave people the chance to make their expertise actionable and share it with others, building a bridge between individual creativity, broader community involvement, and fostering organic growth through viral, user-driven marketing.

We tried to empower our community as much as possible by highlighting our favorite CS Bundle top picks every week and sharing them with Bake’s community.

Here’s an example video featuring Custom Bundle Expert Clarence:

Creating an Affiliate Program: Empowering KOLs

The inception of the Affiliate Program was one of the most exciting developments, allowing Custom Smart Bundles to reach the next level, promoting organic growth, and standing out in the crypto space. Bake’s Custom Smart Bundle KOL Program was a pioneering affiliate service where influential voices in the crypto space could leverage their reach to promote diversified crypto investments. The idea: “Amazon Associates” but for crypto—a way for influencers to share their bundles and earn commissions.

The program incentivized KOLs to promote their custom bundles, earning up to 50% of Bake’s transaction fees from the sales attributed to their unique affiliate links. The structure was tiered, motivating influencers to build and market successful bundles:

This program was not just about promoting Bake but about fostering deeper engagement and encouraging organic growth through authentic community involvement. Influencers could create real value for their audience, showcasing their crypto expertise and helping their followers participate in profitable narratives.

The MVP Phase: Building and Rolling Out

The journey of developing Custom Smart Bundles was ambitious. We began with an MVP, using a simple Typeform flow to build the Bundle Builder to save costs while we tested the idea. We built calculators to showcase potential commission earnings for influencers, created legal agreements, defined clear obligations for both Bake and the influencers, and crafted influencer briefing documents outlining brand guidelines and approval processes for the custom bundles.

We created a system that was ready to go—an outreach tracker for identifying potential influencers, outreach email templates to connect with them, and even analyzed their content to make sure our values aligned. We even integrated AI processes for the approval phase, developing our own GPTs that acted as OPS and compliance team members—automating tasks like checking guidelines, approving, or declining bundle submissions. It was a fully automated solution to streamline operations. We did all the groundwork to get the ball rolling. It was set to be a meaningful launch for Bake, one that aimed to leverage Bake’s growth driven by community enthusiasm and creativity.

The Setback: A Pause in Innovation

And then came the truth bomb. Cake Group faced significant retrenchment due to co-founder court drama. Every MVP, including Custom Smart Bundles, was put on ice. The focus shifted from innovation to survival, and the program was halted before it could see the full light of day.

I won’t sugarcoat it—it was one of the most demotivating moments in my career. I had poured my heart into this project, writing 29 brief documents and over 100 pages to align cross-functional teams. Seeing it paused was disheartening and challenging to accept. But at the end of the day, what mattered most was the work we had done as a team. We created incredible content, built a robust MVP, and delivered on a vision that was forward-thinking and bold. Nobody could take away the experience and the lessons learned from this journey.

Reflecting on the Impact

Even though the Custom Smart Bundles and the Affiliate Program didn’t fully launch outside of its MVP stage with only 100 Custom Bundles launched, it remains one of the highlights of my career. It demonstrated what is possible when creativity, community involvement, and strategic innovation come together. We took a product that was already good and aimed to make it exceptional by empowering our users to be co-creators. And the freedom I was given to lead this project, to be the creative mind driving it forward, was an opportunity that I’ll always be grateful for.

Sometimes, the best projects aren’t the ones that go perfectly or make it to market—they’re the ones that show you what you’re capable of, teach you resilience, and give you a glimpse of what could be possible when everything aligns just right.