At a very high level, most NFTs are part of the Ethereum blockchain, though other blockchains have implemented their own version of NFTs, such as Binance Smart Chain (BSC) and Solana (SOL). Their blockchains keep track of who’s holding and trading NFTs.
Although NFTs can be anything digital (such as drawings, music, and video clips), the present buzz centers largely on utilizing this technology to market digital art.
Hence, defining NFTs as an evolution of fine art collecting only with digital art.
Jack Dorsey, the creator of Twitter, earned slightly under $3 million from the sale of his first tweet. & Beeple’s Everydays: The First 5000 Days, which sold for $69.3 million, was the most well-known NFT transaction (as well as the most expensive NFT sale to date).
Following in the footsteps of the Moonbirds, Mutant Ape Yacht Club, CryptoPunks, and Bored Ape Yacht Club, the DeGods NFT community is now causing quite a stir in the NFT world with a floor price of 356.99 SOL at the moment, which is more than $12407.19.
The project on the brink of extinction is now being compared to the likes of Bored Ape Yacht Club in merely a year. This is a result of brilliant market campaigning and promotion, collaboration with influencers, and targeted and impactful social media marketing, especially on Twitter.
Let’s explore Dust Labs in detail and find what makes them stand apart from other NFT collections.
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What Is Dust Labs?
According to the website, Dust Labs identifies itself as a software development company that helps NFT communities bring more value to their holders.
Dust Labs is an NFT startup built by the creator of DeGods NFT, Frank (@frankdegods), and CEO Kevin (@kevindegods). It specializes in providing NFT tooling to projects on Solana and Ethereum. Dust Labs owns IP behind DeGods (@DeGodsNFT) and y00ts (@y00tsNFT).
Dust Labs’ first product is a scholarship whitelisting tool, “y00tlist”, available on the project’s minting webpage. And it already has inbound customers.
Recently Dust labs grabbed some limelight and made some news in the crypto world which we have discussed below, but first, let’s pay some attention to DUST.
What is DUST?
The DUST community token for DeGods was created to improve the project’s usage. On the Solana blockchain, the SPL coin has a zero initial supply. The group desires a 33,300,000 DUST production ceiling. To mine DUST, a DeGods or DeadGods NFT must be staked. Compared to staked DeadGods which would earn 7.5 DUST, staked DeGods earn 2.5 DUST per day.
DUST is advertised on the DEX Raydium and available for sale with SOL. Collectors can use the token to enter raffles, place bids on items at auction, and begin new collections, but its main use is to turn your DeGod into a DeadGod. Furthermore, the community staked a remarkable 95.8% of DeadGods despite only owning 3.6% of DeGods.
The DeDAO will also actively explore opportunities to infuse DUST usefulness into other significant Solana Ecosystem projects, according to the DeGods team. The supposed restriction that collectors must spend 375 DUST to mint one of the 15,000 y00ts NFTs have been dismissed by one of the DeGods creators, Frank.
Dust Labs’ Latest Fundraise
The news came as a surprise as Dust Labs raised $7 million in seed round funding. It was brought to light after the buzzy y00ts NFT mint went live on Monday night of September 5, 2022.
Several prominent investors participated in the round. These include Chapter One, Foundation Capital, Magic Eden, Metaplex, Jump, FTX Ventures, and Solana Ventures. In a report by CoinDesk, the funding was a 50/50 split between the company’s equity and its $DUST token, the native token of the DeGods NFT project.
There came a tweet from Dust Labs’ Twitter handle which says that this $7M funding will be used to create a $DUST ecosystem.
There was an additional $3.5M was raised via the issuance of a SAFE.
Kevin pointed out that this monetary raise will be used for hiring engineers which are difficult to hire and costs greater investments, along with hiring for various other roles as well. Other roles mentioned include Ops, Customer Support, Sales, Biz Dev, and HR. All these factors will lead to a more efficient company functioning, resulting in an accelerating pace.
Dust Labs AMA and Major Takeaways
Kevin hosted a one-hour AMA (Ask me Anything) on September 8, 2022, where he answered questions like an experienced operator. A lot of credible information was shared at the AMA. Dust Labs laid out its plans and roadmap for the community.
Meanwhile, the cap on the SAFE was unintentionally leaked and sounds like it is a $35M cap & the 10% would be the minimum investors would receive in the instance of an additional raise (could receive more if the valuation of the next raise is sub $35M) – It is a really good sign the company has inbound customers reaching out already. The two most important things for Dust Labs right now are,
- Developing a fully flushed-out product, and
- Finding product market fit (proving people will actually pay for what you’re selling).
Customers reaching out is a good sign they have already found the market-fit product.
The company is tackling both the SOL & ETH ecosystems, which shows they are thinking big. @Mysten_Labs (developers behind the Sui blockchain) is also on their cap table, and Kevin indicated how easy he believes it will be to integrate into additional chains.
Generally, most web3 startups start on one chain and try to gain market share. When they try to expand cross chain they typically have adoption issues as they are viewed by others as they are not native to the new chain (think about Opensea supporting SOL NFTs).
For this reason, the idea of coming out with an omnichain approach out the gate is fascinating.
One thing that needs to be considered is that the team is still figuring things out, which is not bad. Web3 is hard not just because the tech is new but because the landscape you’re operating is changing rapidly. As @frankdegods learned, having too rigid of a plan early on could force you down a path that made sense at one point but doesn’t anymore. Let’s watch how the team adapts over time.
Wrapping Up
They are extremely active on Twitter and are running various campaigns. The community is strong. And they have collaborated with various crypto influencers to have their community engaged. Its y00ts collection is backed by some celebrities like Allen Iverson, Wayne Rooney, and Howie Mandel, and is regularly being discussed on platforms like YouTube and Twitter by some well-established crypto media such as CoinDesk, with crypto influencers on YouTube and Twitter such as NFT Alpha, Jeff Morris Jr. @ Token2049, S◎L Big Brain (33.3%), and more.
All of these were made possible by excellent marketing, which was only made possible with the assistance of an NFT marketing company like Blockwiz. Creating a quality product and connecting with your target market takes an entirely different strategy.
Blockwiz offers a plethora of marketing services essential for an NFT brand to promote its collection and reach the right audience for better ROI and success. Services like Influencer marketing, social media marketing, SEO, content marketing, PR, and consulting.
Services include PR, consulting, SEO, content marketing, social media marketing, and influencer marketing. As you have probably already suspected, Dust Labs seem to have used all of these services for their project.
If you’re an NFT brand interested in working with an experienced group of NFT consultants, get in touch with us. Our incredibly skilled marketers will assist you in starting and operating your project swiftly and efficiently, leading to a more successful project outcome.
