Crypto Startups Have A Responsibility To Bring Clarity, Then Execute Crypto Startup
One thing Binance did better than its competitors was to hire the right people with an innate understanding of branding and positioning on the market.
The company then focused on reaching as wide a market as possible, in as little time as possible. With the benefit of hindsight, this was a tremendously successful move, although perhaps perceived as a gamble at the time.
What differentiated them from most other exchanges was the decision to focus on a global market straight away. Others were bogged down by regulations or rules surrounding a fiat-crypto onramp. Binance tackled those later, rather than in the beginning.
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The official company line is now about embracing regulators and working collaboratively: this is a lot easier to do when there is a hefty war chest and the finest of compliance officers in your arsenal. Binance has correctly ascertained this is absolutely paramount to the longevity of the business, as it is indeed with any serious crypto company.
The level of decisiveness shown by Binance ensured the firm had a fighting chance in an increasingly competitive market. But its defining mission was always to please the customer and this helped consolidate its position as the biggest crypto exchange in the world.
Binance made a point to emphasize customer service from the start. During surges the entire company’s might was commissioned as workers were told to drop other tasks and focus on getting services back to normal. Customer service is viewed very, very seriously at executive level for Binance.
The will to speak to customers and listen to their needs, along with the ability to fulfill in a professional and timely manner what the market wants, is a large part of the success Binance has seen over the years. These are lessons which can be applied to any size of Web3 project.
The Right Voices
What many startups do after a successful seed funding round is embark on a hiring spree.
And of course, to create top tier products and services you need talent, in some cases lots of it.
However a fundamental is often missed, which is the notion of a concise and unified message delivered by fewer voices with more capabilities. In essence, the aim should be to build the best team you can with as few bodies as possible.
A team behind any great product needs to inspire confidence both in investors and consumers, by being seen to be great and capable themselves. An excellent product market fit and vision should be supplemented by the drive and ability of a team who know how to solve the problem they wish to address.
To be clear about the relevant gap in the market and where a project fits into this vision shows true belief in the product. Combined with early traction, this very quickly snowballs into higher investor interest who will buy into not just the solution, but the team itself.
This all falls under the umbrella of excellent communication and how to address different audiences. Investors need to know how the project is progressing, consumers want to know what the product does for them, and regulators will be interested to hear how institutional concerns are planned for.
The ideal team will create consistent messaging on all fronts and essentially convey the same thought processes even when applied to communications with an array of stakeholders. Hence why fewer, more capable voices can be significantly better than a mass confusion of employees.
Bringing Clarity To Murky Places
As hacks, exploits and rug pulls continue to dominate media headlines whenever the mainstream press deign to cover crypto, there is a sore lack of coverage on the methods which could be easily implemented to address these issues.
Real-time blockchain data tracking, alerts and data mining would provide a neat solution. Anything out of the norm can trigger preset parameters to shine a light on where searches or checks may be needed. It can even be automated through smart contract audits, general transactions tracking or a combination of both.
Even after a seemingly successful hack, these funds can always be traced. If stolen crypto is tumbled, there is cutting-edge technology being created to track these transactions.
The culprit may think they can evade being caught in the act, but using these methods to track the movement of stolen funds means authorities can freeze the money after an attempt at liquidation is made: basically, once the hacker tries to convert to fiat they will be stopped.
Of course cyber security is a cat and mouse game, wherein sophisticated hackers evolve methods to combat increasingly sophisticated protections. But conclusions can be garnered through a combination of both on-chain and off-chain security checks, such as IP addresses and other more advanced capabilities employed by expert hackers or law enforcement.
Data service provision and tracking will therefore be big business in blockchain for the very reason it provides well collated and extensive information to make crypto a safer industry. Consumer protection is a key concern for regulators when it comes to the use of cryptocurrencies and this may well alleviate some of these barriers to acceptance and adoption.
Opening Up For Regulators
The future of cryptocurrencies lies in well-thought out regulations marking the boundaries of what is acceptable practice within what is still a very nascent industry.
With that considered, we must see privacy coins as occupying a nebulous space within crypto. Removing or anonymizing certain data does not even guarantee the holder or user cannot be tracked.
But it does attract the ire of regulators who take an extremely dim view of hiding sources of value. Widespread adoption of such protocols for the transfer of value would be difficult due to regulatory clampdowns and will likely remain as a niche use case to hide certain functions, such as messages.
Privacy coin projects not affected by the attention of regulators will likely have some form of backdoor built in, since the biggest hurdle is the intersection between Web3 decentralized interactions and real life usage.
In terms of money laundering, a common criticism leveled at cryptocurrencies, we can actually infer that digital currencies on the blockchain are not the best medium. Inherent transparency in blockchain technology makes everything too open and accessible for all. Fiat is where the vast majority of money laundering takes place, as cash is fungible and easy to mix with cleaner sources; you can readily swap a $50 dollar bill for another.
Communication will be key, as will proper execution of great visions. Defining the next era of the digital age rests, as it has before, in the minds and hands of those building new blockchain solutions with clarity and good intentions both when interacting with consumers and regulators.
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