2025 Web3 Marketing Strategy Analysis: A Practical Guide to KOL Marketing, Global PR, Content Marketing, and Celebrity Endorsements

HashWin

Focused on Web3 Brand Marketing

As the Web3 industry matures, brand promotion strategies have become a crucial weapon for projects vying for market share. Whether it’s wallets, exchanges, infrastructure protocols, or B-end projects like development tools, all require systematic brand promotion to acquire users and build reputation. Amid the alternating crypto bull and bear cycles, many projects once fantasized about achieving overnight fame with a single marketing tactic. However, practice has proven that mature brand promotion demands coordinated efforts across multiple channels. Especially in Web3, where users face complex new technologies, they rely more on credible content guidance and community influence.

This in-depth analysis will focus on four core promotion channels—KOL marketing, global public relations (PR), content marketing, and celebrity endorsements. It will dissect their respective roles, applicable scenarios, ROI (Return on Investment), key metrics, and implementation methods, with illustrative examples from industry leaders such as Binance, Immutable, Polygon, and Chainlink. Following the main content, we will summarize the priority of each channel and synergy strategies at different development stages, providing a actionable "combined promotion approach" for project teams, marketing managers, and brand directors.

Table of Contents

1. KOL Marketing

2. Global PR

3. Content Marketing

4. Celebrity Endorsements

5. Channel Synergy and Combined Strategies

6. Conclusion

7. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

1. KOL Marketing

KOL (Key Opinion Leader) marketing is prevalent across all Web3 segments and serves as a powerful tool for projects to quickly boost community visibility. Web3 KOLs typically refer to crypto opinion leaders or influencers active on platforms like Twitter, YouTube, and Discord, who command loyal followings in specific vertical fields.

Role

Influencer marketing leverages third-party endorsements to build credibility for projects, rapidly gather community attention, and drive user growth. This is particularly effective in Web3, as users need expert guidance to understand complex Web3 products.

Applicable Scenarios

It is ideal for milestones such as new product launches, major feature releases, and campaign preheating—all scenarios where inviting KOLs in relevant fields for reviews or collaborative promotions yields strong results. When a project aims to reach a niche community (e.g., NFT collectors, DeFi traders, or gamers), partnering with KOLs within that circle often achieves twice the result with half the effort.

ROI

The ROI of KOL marketing varies significantly, depending on the alignment between the KOL’s audience and the project’s target users, as well as engagement quality. Some Web3 startups waste budgets by investing in expensive influencer marketing too early, overlooking the overlap between the KOL’s fan base and their own target users. Overall, well-matched KOL collaborations can deliver high exposure and conversions, but they come with high costs and difficulty in precise quantification, requiring careful evaluation.

Key Metrics

Metrics to measure KOL marketing effectiveness include:

• Content exposure (views, likes, reposts)

• Community engagement (comments, discussions, new Discord users)

• Traffic diversion (registrations and conversion rates via KOL-exclusive links or invitation codes)

For affiliate marketing models, tracking actual user conversions brought by each KOL is also essential.

Implementation Methods

1. KOL Selection: Screen KOLs aligned with the project’s positioning, and evaluate their fan demographics and influence.

2. Collaboration Format: Determine the type of partnership, such as social media posts, review videos, or participation in AMAs (Ask Me Anything).

3. Content & Compliance: Prepare clear content guidelines and compliance requirements to ensure the KOL conveys accurate information.

4. Effect Tracking: Use UTM parameters and invitation codes to monitor performance data for post-campaign ROI analysis.

Typical Cases

Immutable X leveraged KOL collaboration to expand its influence when promoting its blockchain gaming ecosystem. For example, Gods Unchained—a game under its umbrella—partnered with world-class gaming influencers, generating significant attention from target gamers. According to its official whitepaper, Immutable successfully improved the game’s user acquisition efficiency through such top-tier KOL collaborations.

Another example is StarkNet, an Ethereum Layer 2 project. In its early stages, it invited crypto KOLs to explain its technical highlights, quickly building a reputation within the developer community. These cases demonstrate that well-executed KOL marketing can serve as a traffic engine for Web3 projects during their cold start phase.

Priority by Brand Stage

• Cold Start Phase: With limited resources, projects should be cautious about KOL marketing. Prioritize long-term partnerships with "micro-KOLs" or community opinion leaders—these collaborations require lower investment, are closer to core user groups, and help cultivate loyal seed users.

• Growth Phase: After gaining a user base and funding, scale up KOL investment and partner with top-tier KOLs to amplify reach. Ensure high alignment between the KOL’s fans and the project’s user demographics to improve ROI.

• Global Expansion Phase: KOL marketing remains important but should focus on regional KOL combinations. Select local influential KOLs in different countries/regions for joint campaigns, synchronized with global PR. At this stage, KOL marketing acts more as a refined operation tool, collaborating with other channels to enhance user engagement and trust in regional markets.

2. Global PR

Global Public Relations (PR) focuses on enhancing brand reputation and visibility through media and public channels.

Role

PR leverages coverage and endorsements from authoritative media to boost a project’s credibility, shaping a professional and positive image among potential users and partners. Unlike direct advertising, PR is "soft promotion" that emphasizes the newsworthiness and topicality of content.

Applicable Scenarios

It is suitable for releasing newsworthy updates, such as major project announcements, funding progress, strategic partnerships, or industry reports. Common PR activities include press releases, media interviews, launch events, and executive bylines in mainstream outlets. When expanding into overseas markets or seeking cross-industry collaborations, global PR is indispensable—it helps brands enter local mainstream discourse by covering media in different regions.

ROI

PR’s ROI is typically reflected in long-term brand value rather than short-term conversions. In the short run, PR is less effective than advertising or KOL marketing for direct user acquisition. However, PR sustains brand influence over time, bringing implicit user growth and partnership opportunities. For example, a report in an authoritative media outlet may not immediately drive a surge in registrations, but it enhances brand awareness and trust, indirectly increasing organic user traffic. Thus, PR returns are measured more by media exposure, public discourse volume, and brand reputation.

Key Metrics

• Media exposure (number of reports, tier of covered media)

• Reach (article views, audience size)

• Share of voice (project’s proportion in industry discussions)

• Sentiment analysis (positive/negative public opinion)

Auxiliary metrics include changes in website traffic and social media mentions. For press releases with trackable links, click-through rates and subsequent user behavior can also be measured.

Implementation Methods

Global PR is usually executed by in-house PR teams or agencies, involving:

1. Topic Planning: Refine project highlights and align them with industry trends to create newsworthy topics.

2. Media Targeting: Identify target media and journalists, and provide exclusive interviews or pre-communicated materials.

3. Distribution: Release official press releases to global media networks through newswire services, in multiple languages if needed.

4. Monitoring & Response: Track media coverage and social feedback, and promptly respond to public opinion or conduct secondary dissemination.

Note: Ensure press releases have genuine newsworthiness—avoid overly promotional content, which is often ignored by Western media. Adapt content to the style and focus of regional media to improve adoption rates.

Typical Case

Polygon’s global PR strategy is widely regarded as an industry benchmark. As an Ethereum scaling solution, Polygon has made frequent headlines in mainstream media since 2021 through a series of high-profile partnerships. It announced collaborations with Nike, Starbucks, Mastercard, Disney, Meta, Adidas, Mercedes-Benz, Reddit, and Google Cloud, introducing users of these international brands to its Web3 ecosystem.

These partnerships were not only covered extensively by crypto media but also featured in mainstream outlets like Forbes and The Wall Street Journal, significantly boosting Polygon’s global recognition and credibility. “These partnerships have helped Polygon deploy its technology in fashion, entertainment, finance, and social media, achieving cross-sector dissemination of its applications,” as noted by industry analysts. For example, Nike’s .SWOOSH NFT platform and Starbucks’ Odyssey digital membership program are both built on Polygon, bringing millions of traditional users into its ecosystem.

Additionally, the Polygon team regularly attends international summits and publishes bylines in top-tier media—all PR initiatives that subtly enhance the brand’s reputation.

Priority by Brand Stage

• Cold Start Phase: For startups, focus PR efforts on vertical industry media. Instead of 勉强 pursuing mainstream media coverage, prioritize getting featured in crypto-specific outlets like CoinDesk, Cointelegraph, Odaily, ChainCatcher, and ForesightNews to build visibility within professional circles. Keep PR investment moderate, focusing on packaging the project’s vision and progress to attract early supporters.

• Growth Phase: As business scales and resources grow, upgrade PR efforts. Deepen relationships with industry media while expanding into tech and financial media to increase visibility among a broader audience of investors and developers. Consider hiring professional PR consultants or partnering with renowned PR agencies for systematic strategy support.

• Global Expansion Phase: PR becomes a top priority as brands seek to establish a presence in international mainstream discourse. Develop a global communication plan covering media matrices in key markets (e.g., the U.S., Europe, Asia), ensuring synchronized dissemination of major announcements. Leverage high-impact events (e.g., large industry summits, policy release milestones) to create topics. In this phase, PR investment increases significantly, shifting from a supporting role to a leading one—driving mainstream market entry and cross-industry partnerships.

3. Content Marketing

Content marketing is hailed as one of the "most long-term valuable" brand promotion channels, applicable to Web3 projects at all stages. It educates the market, unites communities, and subtly influences user perception by consistently delivering high-quality content.

Role

Content marketing aims to engage audiences through knowledge and value, establishing the project’s professional image and authority. For tech-focused B-end projects (e.g., development tools, protocols), high-quality content lowers user understanding barriers and drives adoption.

For example, Chainlink places great emphasis on education in its marketing, prioritizing resources like detailed technical documentation, research blogs, and webinars. By positioning itself as an industry evangelist and thought leader, Chainlink helps developers and enterprises deeply understand oracle technology and its application scenarios—ultimately driving adoption across various fields.

Applicable Scenarios

Content marketing spans the entire user lifecycle:

• Early Stage: Attract potential users with educational articles, whitepapers, and tutorials.

• Mid Stage: Enhance user stickiness and trust with case studies, technical blogs, and video courses.

• Late Stage: Strengthen brand loyalty and community self-propagation with newsletters and in-depth reports.

Content can also pave the way for product launches—many projects publish principle explanations and roadmap updates before launch to build anticipation among early users.

ROI

Content marketing is typically a low-cost, high-compound-return investment. Early-stage projects can produce content even with limited budgets, and accumulated content assets remain effective long-term, driving new traffic through SEO and social sharing. Industry research shows that consistent content output creates a growth flywheel, with ROI increasing over time.

However, content marketing yields results slowly and requires persistence and optimization. Mediocre content may show low short-term ROI, but a "viral" piece or established authoritative reputation can generate substantial long-tail traffic and brand equity.

Key Metrics

• Website traffic and retention (UV/PV, bounce rate, average session duration)

• Conversion rates (e.g., whitepaper downloads, subscription sign-ups)

• SEO performance (keyword ranking improvements, organic search traffic share)

• Social sharing/discussion volume

• Lead conversion (e.g., readers converting to registered users, product testers, or community members)

These metrics are often indirect, requiring comprehensive analysis across marketing funnel stages to evaluate content ROI.

Implementation Methods

1. Strategy Development: Define target audiences, core messaging, and content formats.

2. Content Creation: Use a "theme matrix" approach—consistently produce content around key brand-related topics to achieve comprehensive coverage of specific fields. Common formats include interviews, tutorials, case studies, industry trend insights, and community stories.

3. Distribution: Publish on owned media (official blogs, WeChat Official Accounts, Twitter, Medium) and distribute through communities like Reddit, Zhihu, and Discord. For high-priority content, invite KOLs to review or repost to expand reach.

4. SEO Optimization: Prioritize SEO to maximize long-term content value—optimize keyword placement, acquire backlinks, and improve domain authority. Web3 startups often overlook SEO, but early investment yields significant long-term returns.

5. Differentiation: Leverage team strengths to develop a unique content style (e.g., a technical founder writing regular technical columns or recording podcasts) to attract specific audiences.

Typical Case

Chainlink’s success in content marketing is widely recognized. By regularly publishing high-quality technical blogs, research reports, and tutorials, it has established itself as a thought leader in the blockchain oracle field. Its official blog not only shares product updates but also delves into industry topics like Web3 developer relations and decentralized oracle principles, providing consistent value to the community.

Additionally, Chainlink offers detailed developer documentation and hosts hackathons to encourage developers to adopt its technology. By 2023, thousands of projects had integrated Chainlink’s oracle services—an achievement underpinned by years of content-driven developer trust and preference.

A smaller case is LifeDeFied’s educational campaign: a DeFi startup launched a "Daily DeFi Terminology" series on LinkedIn, focusing on education rather than product promotion. This high-quality content was soon reposted by an industry influencer, driving a surge in the project’s whitelist sign-ups from 1,000 to 16,000 in two weeks. This demonstrates that valuable content often earns organic sharing from KOLs and users, achieving significant impact with minimal investment—and highlights the synergy potential between content marketing and other channels.

Priority by Brand Stage

• Cold Start Phase: Content marketing should be one of the first priorities. With products still in development and budgets limited, teams can leverage professional expertise to create vertical content (e.g., technical principles for tech projects, industry pain point insights for application projects) to build professionalism and lay the groundwork for subsequent marketing.

• Growth Phase: Content marketing remains foundational but requires more systematic operation. Establish official knowledge bases or academies, update content calendars regularly, and align content with product operations (e.g., publishing explanatory articles for each product update). Experiment with diverse formats (live streams, podcasts, user stories) to reach audiences with different preferences.

• Global Expansion Phase: Expand content output to multilingual, multi-platform layouts. Translate and localize existing content for key markets, and create new content tailored to local audience interests. Align content strategy closely with PR—for example, publishing in-depth blogs to elaborate on details after global media coverage, providing more information to technical audiences and reinforcing the brand’s professional image.

4. Celebrity Endorsements

Celebrity endorsements—one of the most topical brand promotion channels—involve partnering with celebrities from the entertainment, sports, or other mainstream fields as brand ambassadors or for co-branded campaigns.

Role

Celebrities bring massive traffic and public attention, helping brands break into mainstream audiences. In Web3, celebrity endorsements are often used to boost brand awareness, acquire non-crypto users, and enhance brand fashionability or credibility.

For example, Khaby Lame—a renowned TikTok influencer—became Binance’s global brand ambassador in 2022. With 142 million global followers, he helped Binance reach entirely new audiences. Binance executives noted that partnering with a megastar like Khaby would make Web3 accessible to broader users and use his humorous, straightforward style to dispel public misconceptions about crypto. This shows that celebrity endorsements not only drive exposure but also enhance brand approachability and eliminate cognitive barriers through the celebrity’s image.

Applicable Scenarios

Celebrity endorsements are ideal for brands in the expansion phase seeking to quickly boost mass-market recognition or differentiate their marketing. For example, exchanges and top NFT platforms often partner with sports or music celebrities for co-branded NFTs or advertising when pursuing global expansion.

They are also effective for major events (e.g., brand anniversaries, large-scale advertising campaigns) or new market entry (e.g., partnering with local celebrities to enter a specific country). However, careful selection of celebrities aligned with the brand’s tone and with a positive image is critical to avoid backlash.

ROI

Celebrity endorsements typically require high investment (including endorsement fees and promotional material production). Short-term ROI is reflected in a surge in brand discourse and search volume, but direct conversion ROI is difficult to quantify. Measurement focuses more on brand metrics: increased media mentions, social media follower growth, and website traffic spikes during the campaign.

Long-term, successful celebrity partnerships significantly enhance brand equity and mainstream recognition—value that traditional marketing struggles to match. For example, after Binance entered into an exclusive NFT collaboration with football legend Cristiano Ronaldo (CR7), it launched a global promotional campaign, introducing CR7’s hundreds of millions of fans to Web3 and NFTs. The first batch of NFTs in the collaboration sold out quickly, and Binance aimed to "help CR7’s fans engage deeply with Web3 and provide them with an entry point into the NFT space." The brand communication effect of this celebrity partnership far exceeded what traditional marketing could achieve.

Key Metrics

• Views, reposts, and discussions of endorsement-related content

• Engagement on the celebrity’s personal social media posts about the brand

• Changes in the brand’s Google Search Index and website traffic during the campaign

For partnerships involving specific products (e.g., NFT sales, fan tokens), hard metrics like sales volume and user growth are also tracked. For example, the "KUN" series NFTs—co-created by Cai Xukun and Gate.io—sold out instantly during the limited release and saw significant secondary market premiums. This case demonstrates that combining celebrity traffic with crypto product models can convert fans into crypto users while supporting their idols, creating a win-win scenario.

Implementation Methods

1. Celebrity Selection: Choose celebrity types (e.g., sports stars, actors, musicians) aligned with the brand’s positioning and target audience. Evaluate their global influence, fan demographics, and past commercial reputation to ensure alignment with brand values.

2. Partnership Negotiation: Determine the collaboration format—long-term brand ambassador roles or one-off campaign/co-branded product partnerships. Clarify promotional commitments (e.g., social media posts, event attendance, commercial filming) in the contract.

3. Creative Planning: Develop story-driven marketing concepts that leverage the celebrity’s strengths and fan culture to resonate with the public. For example, Binance had Khaby Lame film a series of humorous short videos using his signature silent gestures to explain crypto knowledge.

4. Multi-Channel Promotion: Execute promotions across channels, including official announcements, press conferences, online/offline advertising, and encouraging fan UGC (user-generated content) to maximize reach. Maintain close communication with the celebrity’s team during execution to address emerging public opinion and adjust strategies as needed.

Typical Case

Binance leads the industry in celebrity marketing. Beyond the Khaby Lame partnership, its multi-year collaboration with CR7 stands out: the two parties not only released CR7’s personal NFT collection but also invested heavily in global marketing to introduce CR7’s fans to Web3 and NFTs. According to Wu Shuo Blockchain, Binance aimed to "help traditional sports fans easily enter the crypto space" through this collaboration.

Binance has also partnered with celebrities across regions: launching co-branded NFTs with pop idols in Asia, inviting cricket stars to promote in South Asia, and sponsoring celebrity events in Latin America and Africa. This multi-tiered celebrity marketing portfolio has made Binance’s brand more accessible and mainstream, capturing cross-sector attention globally.

Other examples include Crypto.com— which sponsored an NBA arena and featured Hollywood actor Matt Damon in its commercials to align the brand with mainstream culture—and FTX (despite its controversial outcome), which partnered with NFL stars for promotions. Overall, celebrity endorsements are a "icing on the cake" strategy: when a brand has a solid foundation and seeks to elevate its visibility, leveraging celebrity influence often delivers explosive results.

Priority by Brand Stage

• Cold Start/Early Phase: Celebrity endorsements are rarely a priority. High costs and inefficient mass communication make them low-value investments. Startups should focus on product development and core user growth instead.

• Growth Phase: Explore small-scale celebrity collaborations if opportunities arise. For example, partner with industry figures (e.g., senior developers, investors—non-entertainment celebrities with industry influence) for endorsements or invite local niche celebrities to participate in community events. These low-cost "soft endorsements" enhance credibility without overspending.

• Global Expansion Phase: With sufficient budgets and a mature brand positioning, celebrity endorsements can become a strategic priority. The goal is to achieve large-scale brand awareness growth, where celebrity influence delivers maximum value.

Note: Adapt celebrity selection to regional preferences during global expansion—partner with international sports/music stars for Western markets, local entertainment idols for Asian markets, and so on. In this phase, celebrity-driven discussions also complement other channels—increasing media coverage opportunities and triggering viral social media spread to sustain brand momentum. Thus, celebrity endorsements can be a "game-changing" marketing tool for mature brands, forming a complete promotion matrix with other channels.

5. Channel Synergy and Combined Strategies

The above analysis details the characteristics of KOL marketing, global PR, content marketing, and celebrity endorsements. However, successful brand promotion rarely relies on a single channel; instead, it requires the clever combination of multiple tactics to create synergy. In practice, channels are not isolated—they can support and amplify each other’s effects.

For example, a high-quality content piece can drive long-term organic traffic through SEO, be reposted by KOLs on social media to trigger viral marketing, and then be pitched to media by PR teams for mainstream coverage—achieving a "1+1>2" effect. Conversely, traffic surges from large-scale celebrity campaigns should be supported by content and community operations to convert public interest into in-depth product understanding and long-term engagement. Only with this "combined punch" can Web3 projects stand out in a competitive market.

Combined Strategy by Brand Stage

1. Cold Start Phase

Focus on content marketing + community KOLs, supplemented by small-scale PR.

• Use high-quality content to attract early tech-savvy users and developers, turning seed users into brand advocates.

• Partner with "small but effective" KOLs in vertical fields for in-depth engagement to build a core community.

• Concentrate PR efforts on industry media to publish the project’s vision and progress, shaping a professional image.

• Avoid large-scale celebrity marketing due to high costs and inefficient targeting.

2. Growth Phase

Pursue balanced investment across channels to expand reach while retaining community loyalty.

• Maintain consistent content output, optimizing topics based on user feedback (e.g., tutorials, case studies).

• Expand KOL partnerships to include diverse types (tech, investment, entertainment) to avoid over-reliance on a single influencer.

• Strengthen PR by deepening industry media relationships and expanding into tech/financial media.

• Test celebrity effects with small-scale initiatives (e.g., regional endorsements or industry figure collaborations).

• Ensure consistent brand messaging across content, KOLs, and PR to avoid fragmentation.

3. Global Expansion Phase

Launch integrated marketing campaigns for maximum synergy.

• Define a unified brand communication theme, then leverage each channel’s strengths:

• Content team: Produce in-depth series to explain brand philosophy and technical advantages.

• Celebrity partnerships: Collaborate with globally influential celebrities or cross-sector IPs to trigger media and social buzz.

• PR team: Synchronize press releases across key global markets to secure authoritative coverage.

• KOLs: Partner with local KOLs for secondary dissemination and community engagement in local languages.

• Establish a data monitoring and feedback mechanism: Track real-time performance across channels, analyze effective combinations, and adjust resource allocation promptly. For example, if a region shows strong celebrity impact but weak KOL support, quickly supplement local KOL partnerships.

In summary, promotion channels should not operate in silos but integrate into a comprehensive strategy. For projects, the key is to align tactics with their stage and goals: focus on content + community in early stages, expand across channels in growth stages, and pursue integrated campaigns in expansion stages. By prioritizing data-driven optimization and avoiding over-reliance on a single channel, projects can create resonant brand messaging across channels—achieving maximum promotion impact with minimal resources.

6. Conclusion

There is no one-size-fits-all approach to brand promotion for Web3 B-end projects. KOL marketing empowers community communication, global PR builds credibility, content marketing accumulates long-term momentum, and celebrity endorsements drive mainstream breakthroughs—each serving unique needs at different brand stages. Mature projects often integrate these channels to create a unique "combined promotion approach."

This analysis clarifies the mechanism and practical applications of each channel, as well as their advantages, disadvantages, and ROI considerations. In practice, projects must allocate resources flexibly based on their positioning: prioritize content + community in early stages, expand across channels in mid-stages, and pursue integrated campaigns in later stages—while always focusing on data-driven optimization.

It is worth emphasizing that as Web3 competition intensifies, users are becoming more resistant to marketing noise. Thus, brand promotion must return to user value—engaging audiences with sincerity and valuable content rather than superficial hype. Only when channels align around delivering user value can brands build long-term trust and loyalty. With creative execution and resource investment, Web3 projects can establish a distinct global brand identity and achieve sustained growth.

Finally, we hope this in-depth study provides systematic guidance for Web3 marketing and brand managers. Covering strategy planning, channel execution, and synergy, it aims to support teams in navigating the dynamic crypto industry. By continuously learning and iterating marketing tactics, outstanding products can gain greater visibility, recognition, and adoption—accelerating the advancement of the entire Web3 ecosystem.

7. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Q1: Which promotion method should I choose with a limited budget?

Prioritize content marketing and micro-KOL collaborations—they are low-cost and deliver high conversion rates.

Q2: How to evaluate promotion effectiveness?

Track metrics such as user growth, traffic changes, social engagement, and brand mentions.

Q3: What is the difference between celebrity endorsements and KOL marketing?

Celebrities focus on mainstream breakthroughs and buzz creation, while KOLs excel at precision conversion and community building.

Q4: Is PR a waste if it doesn’t drive new user sign-ups?

No. PR primarily enhances brand credibility—its long-term value outweighs short-term conversions.

Q5: How to maximize synergy across multiple channels?

Ensure unified timing, aligned messaging, content linkage, and data-driven real-time adjustments.