Nothing gets marketers more aroused than the prospect of co-announcing a partnership with a $100M+ TVL project. Why? Because they have established communities and you get to piggyback off their success. Nothing wrong with that, especially if your product is the bomb. This is, in my humble opinion, the best and easiest way to grow your community. 

But how do co-announcements even work? How do you get @chadproject to say they’re excited to be partnering up with you? How do you coordinate it? Who pays for any external resources looped in the announcement? 

First off, it’s a game of networking. But networking has little to offer if you lack an established public image. Those people who’d be insta-clicking your Twitter profile must understand why you’re a chad project within 5 seconds - the average attention span of not just a crypto degen, but anyone raised on smartphone narcotics. So take this opportunity to make it as easy as possible. 

I shall now guide you through the standard partnership process and reveal what happens behind the scenes. 

‍The Introduction

I’ll keep things high-level here, meaning that I won’t dive into how you actually get a connector to make intros. That’s another chapter.

Your CEO’s or CBDO’s contact makes an intro to a project’s BD boss - this may either happen spontaneously or after sentiments are checked on both sides. Usually, you’ll be added to a TG group, and your contact will say a few words about both parties. 

This is the standard format - chads spice it up: 

Hey @CBDOofChadProject, please meet @SmallProjectBoss, the CEO of @SmallProject. They’re looking to bridge/deploy/develop/partner with @ChadProject. Best of luck, gents! 

‍Inking the Deal

Now, depending on the pull of your connector and how available @CBDOofChadProject is, a call will be scheduled, perhaps after your project gets to share an overview of what they’re building and how they envision a collab. Warning - you’ll soon start to flare up every time you read or are forced to write  “let’s explore synergies”. It’s ok, there’s therapy available and you’ll get over it. Eventually. 

This isn’t a guide on how CEOs should handle calls - though, there’s a ton I’ll be writing about that too. So let’s assume the call went well, your collaboration is inked, @CBDOofChadProject is okay with a co-announcement, and both parties' dream merchants are added to the group. 

Time to make some magic happen. 

‍The Dream Merchants Complot

As the CMO of the smaller project, it’s your job to make it easy for @ChadProjectCMO to co-announce without taking advantage of their resources, unless expressly offered. It’s your job to explain what you’re giving back. 

The moment approval on the co-ANN is given, your sole purpose in life is to create a working document for the announcement. 

‍This working document should ideally include: ‍

• Graphic design of your logos

Side-by-side or in whatever format @ChadProject prefers - check their social pages for previous co-announcements. If there’s not a media kit (with lots of valuable intel) publicly available, ask for one. Doing your marketing due diligence will also help you see how they generally promote these. You want to get the most out of it, but unless it’s been discussed, you don’t want to ask for a lot more.

• Announcement blog 

Make sure it’s well-written, promote both brands, link accordingly, and proofread it several times. Make sure to follow the narratives @ChadProject pushes instead of your 10-minute understanding of their project.  Show how you’re shining a new perspective on their project, not just recapitulating their own words back to them.

• Announcement tweet

Keep it concise and fun, but make sure to explain the scope of your collaboration. “We are excited to form a strategic partnership with @ChadProject” is too little. A 20 tweet thread that goes over the founders’ breakfast, body count, and vision for web3.5 is too much. Strike a balance. Also, proofread. Twice. You won’t be RT-ed if you don’t. 

• Your media kit

Whether you choose to publish a public media kit is a matter of nuance and there are opinions on both sides of the debate. However, you must have an internal media kit that simplifies co-announcements and media coverage. 

Your kit should include your boilerplate (up to 200 carefully-chosen words that describe the high-level overview of your brand), logos in multiple formats, sizes, and colors (if you do have multi-colour logos, some brands choose a dark and light variant; SVG & PNG are a must), and links to your social channels. 

‍Ready? Time to make it happen. 

Once your document is ready, send it over and tag the relevant parties. Ideally also ask how their timeline is looking - depending on the scope of the partnership, co-marketing might happen before and after the integration (if there’s an integration) is complete, but also post-integration. 

Once there’s a date set for the announcement, you can start discussing specifics like: 

• What time are we going live?
• Are we doing any PR? 
• Are we engaging influencers? 
• Are we doing an AMA?
• Are we hosting a Twitter Space?
• Are we putting on latex suits and rolling around a conference’s venue in a miscalculated performance art happening?

Before you ask these questions, READ THE ROOM. If they offered a boring reply to the initial co-marketing discussion like ‘sure, we can RT’, then @ChadProject probably won’t help too much. That’s okay. The way you push this announcement, the growth of your project, and the mutually-beneficial results that occur will pave the way to a better co-marketing collab in the future. 

Once all is ready, stick to the plan, post the announcement at the agreed upon time, and keep comms open in your internal group chat. You are free to engage resources on your side (like influencers or PR) as long as you believe their quality won’t taint the other brand’s look. 

Depending on the size of @ChadProject, you may have lots of people following you and joining your groups. Be there for them, give your mods a heads-up, and post lots of content to keep them entertained. People get bored quickly - if they join and find a dead group, that won’t be a great first impression. Activity is everything.

‍Hot tip: You now have a direct line of comms with @CMOofChadProject. Find an angle and try to use it. Never be afraid to hop on a random call to learn more. When you do message, don’t just message about the co-announcement or your partnership - the larger group is there for that. Instead, message with a personal question or leverage your unique edge to provide some value. Foster this relationship over time and watch it grow. It’ll not only give your project better marketing opportunities in the future, but in Web3, networking is everything, so you’ll tap into those opportunities personally as well. 

Clear? Good. Now, if you need help for your ANN blogs & graphics, hit us up. Even if your ANN is today. Use this if ya wanna be uber quick.