Social media is no joke, even if it runs on humor. Getting it right takes planning, knowhow and a solid strategy – just like all other marketing.

Every new internet era brings new ways to reach your customers - and increases the risks of getting it wrong. That’s more true now than ever. TV’s Mad Men made advertising look so glamorous. Modern marketers could well feel nostalgic, not just for the aesthetic, but for the relative simplicity of what 1960s advertisers had to work with.

Things are looking up for your tech startup. You’ve got a minimum viable product in the pipeline, a dedicated team in place and some initial funding. Don’t relax just yet. Building a great product is just part of the job.

The January sales are over for another year. And it’s quite probable that most of us succumbed and bought something highly unsuitable simply because it was so cheap, which will now sit unloved before making its inevitable journey to the landfill site. It’s fast-fashion, and despite our best intentions, it seems to be here to stay.

In the past decade, technology has had a colossal impact on a wide range of economic sectors. However, real estate has been more resistant to change than many other domains due to complex, bureaucratic legacy processes that have become embedded over generations. Nevertheless, real estate has some real problems, so change is now inevitable.

The Corona pandemic has changed many things: how we work, how we communicate with each other, and also how we handle our clients’ needs. Our working environment changed from one day to another, and we’ve been working from home since March with just a few days in the office during summer when it was safe.

This isn’t your usual David versus Goliath story exactly. It’s more: Goliath finds David’s ideas cool and sexy, and so they hook up and start working together. In fact, in recent years many established corporations have actively been looking for startups to buy. Tim Cook, for instance, has declared that Apple buys a company every three weeks on average.

Today, we expect to be able to track what we buy. Whether buying gadgets, clothes or food online, real-time tracking gives us peace of mind, reassuring us that our “investment” is on the way and not lost somewhere. So the question is, why don’t we have the same attitude when it comes to charity fundraising?

With the coronavirus spreading throughout the world, startups are turning to artificial intelligence and machine learning to help scientists develop a vaccine in order to halt and reverse its spread. How can AI help in medicine generally and how can the technology be used to develop medication and vaccines to stem future epidemics?

What does the landing gear of a Boeing 737 have in common with a one-story house in Cambodia? They are both being tracked using blockchain technology by an innovative US startup, Ubitquity LLC. Although these use cases may seem worlds apart, they both stem from a common technical challenge: how to securely and verifiably trace the origin of physical items in the digital world.

When people hear the words “blockchain gaming”, they often think of games like CryptoKitties, the Ethereum-based gaming platform that gained popularity a few years ago. But blockchain gaming is much more than just selling and buying virtual kittens — it is now being used to manage the purchase and trade of collectible in-game assets in more conventional games.

At THE RELEVANCE HOUSE, we love chatting to exciting new brands and hearing their stories. We recently met Philipp Mayer and Lukas Pünder from CANO, a young shoe brand based in Germany, but producing in Mexico. Philipp and Lukas founded the brand in 2016 with the aim of creating unique leather shoes inspired by the traditional Mexican Huarache shoes.

There has been a growing number of public trials of blockchain-based voting systems recently. One reason for this flurry of activity is the increased emphasis on election security in the wake of the 2016 US presidential elections. While the electoral interference mainly involved social media manipulation and fake news, it has also turned attention to the outdated and insecure e-voting equipment in the US.

Innovation is a tricky thing to define — where do the borders lie in a brand-new field? Take Bidooh, for example. They’re a UK startup whose product is an interactive digital billboard system that employs a blockchain-based payment layer. They sell advertising as a service, have a functional product, held a multi-million dollar ICO, and work intensively with machine learning and AI.

One of the most promising applications of blockchain that is currently in development is digital identity. According to a new report by Grand View Research, the identity management market is expected to reach USD 24.12 billion by 2025, at a CAGR of 13.1% over the forecast period. The report notes that the proliferation of web-based applications, coupled with an increasing demand for more efficient risk and audit management systems are key factors driving growth in the sector.

Social media is often blamed for people’s short attention span. However, it can also be turned the other way around: people’s short attention span is modifying the way we communicate on social media. In fact, in our shaped-by-smartphone world, consumers value immediacy, relevance, and convenience.

Can a blockchain project effectively market itself, using in-house resources, startup grit, and a healthy can-do, bootstrapping attitude?No. Not at all — or at least, not if they want to succeed.

Professional networking is much easier than before. Social media platforms now dominate the scene and there are hundreds of potential events to attend every year, meaning that it’s easier than ever to make new acquaintances. This article will outline some of the benefits of cultivating a network in the blockchain community.

The world of content marketing is booming and quickly evolving. Social media platforms are flooded with all sorts of content — from factual information, to instructional guides, ads and entertainment. This forces companies to constantly be on the lookout for the next hot topic, which might surface at any time.

In our previous article on how blockchain adoption will affect the average user, we discussed the fact that blockchain technology is essentially a database, and that end users rarely need a database. Business, on the other hand, lives on databases. From employee records to client lists, and everything in-between — where there’s information, there’s a database of some sort behind it — and a frightening number of them are vulnerable.

As the crypto winter of 2018 — Q1 2019 is officially declared “over”, it’s time to have a look at the damage done to the blockchain sector. As the first and main application of blockchain technology during this period, the value of all cryptocurrencies as measured in dollars dropped by 80% from its peak, a crash that rivals the bursting of the dot-com bubble in 2000.

Sometimes, amidst the continual back and forth of blockchain hype, we hear the question “So what does it do for me?” It’s a good question. In fact, it’s the question. After all, if we can’t answer that properly, blockchain technology will never be widely adopted.

In early January 2018, the crypto market was on fire. It was a time of frenzied excitement as token values skyrocketed and the combined market cap for cryptocurrencies soared to $813 billion. Then, irrational exuberance switched to pessimism: the bubble burst and the fallout was swift and brutal. By December, the market had crashed to $101 billion, an overall decline of 88% from the peak.

At THE RELEVANCE HOUSE, we don’t often talk about ourselves — we prefer to focus on the industry and our clients, and generally get on with doing what we do. However, sometimes it’s good to lift the curtain and show what’s going on backstage to help the magic happen.

It’s not what you say, it’s the way that you say it. Being able to speak to the media is a fundamental skill for business leaders. From short one-on-ones, to round tables with many journalists, it’s a skill that needs to be mastered. However, not everybody feels comfortable in this kind of situation, especially if their interlocutor is analyzing every word through a critical lens.

And it was sufficient. However, those times are over. In 2017, it seemed like any kid with a bright idea could write (or plagiarize!) a whitepaper, hold an ICO, and pull in millions or more. Websites offered best practices for whitepaper production, emphasising ideas like “This single PDF, if done correctly, can fetch you millions of dollars in under 24 hours.”

Everyone’s talking about the tremendous potential of blockchain and judging by the amount of investment by large corporations, confidence in the technology is high. Indeed, 61% of firms in the digital economy are currently investing in blockchain technology according to a survey by identity management firm Okta.

If you’re up to date with what happens in the crypto scene, the name “Bitconnect” might ring a bell, or remind you of the scream: “Hey, hey, hey!”. Apparently, even after the clamorous finding that the company was just a Pyramid scheme, the founders are not giving up and are launching “Bitconnect 2.0” this July.

Public relations is about managing communication between a company and its stakeholders, be they customers, investors or the wider public. Without public relations, a company wouldn’t be known outside its own four walls, and would miss out on sales opportunities, new clients, and new business partners.

The blockchain scene is hyper competitive at the moment — thousands of startups with great ideas and talented developers are competing with each other for a limited pool of investment. For those seeking to gain a competitive edge, growth hacking is a term you need to become familiar with.

If blockchain technology was personified, right now it’d be a rebellious teenager vaping in the bathroom and telling the “grownups” that they’re wrong about everything, and how when they grow up they’ll change the world.

Earlier this year, Corey Doctorow wrote an interesting op-ed on disruption for Locus. This got us thinking about the creation, politicization and eventual demonization of buzzwords in business. The most interesting notion was how Doctorow dismantles the notion that somehow “disruptive” means “better” by looking at Uber and its ilk — specifically that while Uber may be “taxi 2.0”, it isn’t intrinsically better than taxi 1.0. It just has a different set of downsides, and as Uber moves towards its IPO, it’s getting more… taxi 1.0-ish.

As the blockchain landscape continues to evolve, different countries are taking vastly different approaches to regulation. For example, China has placed an outright ban on cryptocurrencies and ICOs. In the US, there has long been talk of regulating digital currencies, but as yet no laws have been passed.

At the height of the ICO boom in 2017 and early 2018, blockchain startups were awash with funding. VC firms and individual investors poured in their cash, in the hope of making big returns. However, during the second half of 2018, ICO funding had plummeted 90% from its previous highs. The crypto winter took hold.

During the frenzy of the ICO craze of 2017–2018, branding meant little more than creating a logo and building hype on social media. Those times are over — in the current economic climate, only startups with solid tokenomics, a sound business plan and strong branding will survive. Thus, a strong branding strategy is essential to convince the doubters.

Nowadays working in a startup could be considered a choice for overachievers. Startups are known to be hectic environments, and stress is a given. So much coffee is consumed every day that it would probably be more efficient to administer it intravenously. Everyone chasing the same dream that things will be quicker and easier than before. Nice idea, right?

There are a number of misconceptions regarding blockchain technology that tend to cause misunderstandings. People don’t know how it works and confuse it with other things, such as Bitcoin. If the technology is to be adopted more widely, people need to develop a more fundamental understanding of how blockchain can serve as a catalyst for transformation.

Effective social media community management is just as important as producing good content. The history of social media has repeatedly shown that you ignore your community at your peril, and this is especially relevant for companies launching an ICO or STO. Ideally, people become united under a common banner and feel embraced in a community that shares their ideals.

“Eschew obfuscation” is a humorous, ironic phrase often used by teachers and professors when advising students on their writing style. Although it literally means “avoid being unclear”, the words are rare enough that many native English speakers would not know what it means. Basically, the lesson here is that “it’s not what you say, it’s the way that you say it”.

Robot vs Humans is a topic that has often been portrayed in Hollywood films and renowned science-fiction books. Their relationship is usually characterised as adversarial: two parties that either fight or exploit each other, like in I, Robot or Ex-Machina for example.

Nowadays, if you say “cryptocurrency” or “Bitcoin” everyone seems to know what you are talking about. They nod, they say they have heard of it, and some even quote the last graph they have seen on the news. It is incredible how the awareness of the crypto world has grown in recent years; from obscurity to something you hear discussed in a pub.

The exponential growth of cryptocurrency has opened the floodgates to a sea of information. For a newcomer to the crypto scene, this can quickly lead to information overload. Learning about this world can be pretty frustrating and overwhelming for the uninitiated. “Is this information correct?” or “can I trust this source?”

In the road to an ICO, many blockchain and crypto start-ups get lost in the technical details behind their game-changer idea while the team behind it takes a back seat.

Happy Birthday Bitcoin! The most popular app-based on blockchain technology is celebrating its 10th anniversary this 31 October.

For all of the good things blockchain and cryptos can bring to the world, there is also a dark side that can be explained through the Seven Deadly Sins.

The concept of “fake news” is not limited to the political arena these days. Thanks to an ever-expanding number of channels, it is quickly invading every facet of our lives.

In the past year, the blockchain community has gained tremendous momentum.

When you are trying to start a new business, one of the first things you will hear is “you need to create an elevator pitch”. We disagree.