Co-authors:
Andrea Chang, Partner, Oak Grove Ventures;
Alan Cui, Product Advisor, Oak Grove Ventures;
In the rapid development of the blockchain field, the TON ecosystem has stood out with its unique growth path. By drawing on the successful experience of WeChat Mini Programs, TON’s MiniApps have not only driven user expansion in the ecosystem but also provided innovative business models and effective traffic strategies for Web3 projects. These MiniApps demonstrate powerful user acquisition capabilities on Telegram channels, enabling Web3 projects to quickly reach a broad user base. This article will delve into the rapid growth of the TON ecosystem, analyzing how it uses MiniApps to provide valuable business model references and traffic acquisition solutions for future Web3 users on Telegram and other Web2 channels, helping them succeed in an increasingly competitive market.
- Significant Growth of On-chain Data in the TON Ecosystem
The common metrics of evaluating the growth level of an ecosystem include transaction volume, active address, smart contract developments, total value locked, network fees, validator participation, token transfers, and MiniApp interactions.
Source: https://www.tonstat.com/, as of Sep. 30, 2024
User acquisition strategy on TON
Social Viral Growth: A Low-Cost, Highly Effective User Growth Strategy
Social viral growth is a highly effective user acquisition strategy, especially widely applied in social platforms. By relying on users’ social networks, social viral growth achieves rapid user growth through relationship chain propagation. Compared to traditional advertising marketing, social viral growth is lower in cost and has higher persuasive power, as users are more likely to trust recommendations from friends or family. Moreover, social viral growth utilizes network effects and viral mechanics to create exponential spreading effects, bringing precise user growth. Users acquired through this viral spread usually share similar interests, needs, and behavioral characteristics with the target users, making the propagation more effective. At the same time, relying on frequently used social products in daily life, user stickiness is higher, enabling more frequent use of these platforms and products.
Learning from WeChat’s Viral Strategies
WeChat, as a successful example of social viral growth, provides rich experiences for other platforms to learn from in aspects such as mini-program operations, external link management, and personal account usage regulations. Viral mechanics that were once banned on WeChat can be tried again on Telegram. By learning from WeChat’s operational experiences, projects on Telegram can utilize these social viral strategies to achieve viral spread and rapid user growth.
Use case: Games
Depending on the complexity of products and businesses, viral user acquisition methods can be divided into several levels:
- Zero-investment earning type: Attracting users through simple online earning mechanisms. Projects like Notcoin and Hamster Kombat have hundreds of millions of users and massive channel subscribers on Telegram.
- Probability-based Gaming: Viral mechanics combined with probability-based draws, such as opening red envelopes, lucky wheel spins, or opening mystery boxes. Typical projects include Catizen (cat raising) and TonGifts (sending red envelopes). These types of projects rely on social networks for rapid user expansion.
- Casual Gaming: Attracting users through more complex game mechanics and entertainment scenarios, such as Catizen and PixelTap (robot battles). These casual mini-games increase user stickiness and engagement through deep user interactions.
Use case: Memecoin
User acquisition strategies are crucial not only for traditional products but also for promoting Memecoins. The diffusion path of Memecoins can be compared to the difference between natural and synthetic diamonds. Natural Memecoins spread spontaneously through communities, typically expanding from Reddit to Telegram or Discord, then to broader social platforms. Synthetic Memecoins, on the other hand, achieve rapid viral spread within Telegram through social viral strategies.
To create a hit Memecoin, the key lies in the strategy of “making miracles with great effort + surrounding the cities from the countryside,” utilizing low-cost and high-impact social scenarios for promotion. Developer-friendly environments and fair design are also important factors in attracting users. Additionally, creating FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) emotions encourages more people to participate, forming strong consensus and user traffic.
These user acquisition strategies have played a crucial role not only in Memecoin incubation but also in providing powerful momentum for user growth in the Telegram and TON ecosystems. This strategy has opened up vast space for the future development of the Web3 ecosystem.
- Phenomenal Success Case Study: Notcoin
Notcoin is a social clicker game accessible via Telegram, which has rapidly attracted a large user base since its official launch on January 1, 2024. The game achieved impressive numbers in just a few months: 40 million Telegram users, 8 million Telegram channel subscribers, and 6 million daily active users. Here are the key timeline points in its development:
- January 1, 2024: Official game launch.
- January 26, 2024: Cumulative users reached 20 million.
- February 29, 2024: Joint activity with Binance.
- March 8, 2024: Opened Pre-Market on Getgems, 10M Notcoin points exchangeable for one NFT voucher (ultimately equal to 10,000 $NOT).
- March 30, 2024: Announced token economics, declaring 100% of NOT tokens will be distributed to players.
- April 12, 2024: Ended game mining and announced the official economic model.
- May 16, 2024: Simultaneously listed on Binance, OKX, and Bybit.
We can attribute Notcoin’s success into the following factors:
- Ecosystem alignment with telegram: Telegram requires a thriving ecosystem with numerous applications similar to WeChat mini-programs, allowing developers to profit from them. Notcoin perfectly meets this demand.
- Collaboration with TON Foundation: The TON Foundation needs to establish utility and business models for TON tokens by building an application ecosystem. Notcoin serves as an ideal application scenario for this purpose.
- Exchange listing strategy: In the current bearish market sentiment, exchanges urgently need new Web3 users. Notcoin’s large-scale user base provides them with this opportunity.
- User-Centric Approach for both Web3 and Web2 users: Additionally, Notcoin’s success is attributed to meeting the needs of different user groups, such as the fairness sought by experienced Web3 users, and the low-entry barrier, high-return desires of new Web2 users.
This case study of Notcoin illustrates the power of creating applications that align with the needs of multiple stakeholders in the blockchain ecosystem. It showcases how a well-designed application can bridge the gap between Web2 and Web3 users.
Main Business Models of Telegram + TON
1. 1. In-App Purchases (Virtual Value-Added Services)
This model, as the main revenue model for WeChat’s mini-game ecosystem, has produced several hit paid products, such as “Sheep a Sheep” in 2021.
By Q2 2024, WeChat mini-games’ monthly active users exceeded 500 million, with estimated annual revenue reaching 40 billion RMB. Below is the WeChat mini-game bestseller list for June 2024:
Genre distribution ratio of the top 40 WeChat mini-games in June
Source: DataEye
Similar to WeChat mini-games, in-app purchases have become a successful business model in the Telegram + TON ecosystem, especially in gaming. Catizen is a typical representative of this model. Since its release in March 2024, Catizen has attracted over 50 million users in less than four months and generated over $20 million in revenue through in-game purchases. Notably, Catizen’s success is reflected not only in its large user base but also in its high ARPU (Average Revenue Per User). Moreover, 40% of Telegram Premium users are Catizen players, indicating a high integration of virtual value-added services with social platforms, bringing significant profit opportunities for developers.
2. Token Issuance and Exchange Listing
Token issuance and exchange listing is another major business model in the Telegram + TON ecosystem, with the Notcoin project being a successful example. Since its official launch in January 2024, Notcoin quickly accumulated 40 million users and successfully brought the NOT token to market through a series of activities and strategic cooperations (such as the Binance joint activity and Pre-Market on Getgems). This model not only helped Notcoin rapidly expand its user base but also achieved a seamless transition from gaming to financial markets through its token economic model. Eventually, Notcoin’s token successfully listed on major exchanges like Binance, OKX, and Bybit, further consolidating its market position. In late September, Catizen and Hamster also successfully listed on exchanges.
3. Traffic Monetization — Selling, Joint Operation Incubation
Traffic Selling: Efficient Monetization Strategy
In the Telegram + TON ecosystem, traffic selling has become an efficient and direct monetization strategy. Projects like Holdcoin, Tomarket, and Banana represent this model, generating considerable income by selling user traffic from Telegram channels and operating multiple projects daily. The selling price for a single user on mainstream platforms ranges from $0.03 to $0.1, depending on the quantity, quality, and regional distribution of users. This model not only quickly generates cash flow but also provides a convenient user acquisition channel for small and medium-sized projects.
Traffic Joint Operation: Incubating New Projects Leveraging Mature Ecosystems
The traffic joint operation model, known as the “Cheetah Model,” has been widely applied in the Telegram + TON ecosystem. Catizen’s long-term plan includes this strategy, aiming to incubate 200 games that were once popular in the WeChat ecosystem. By leveraging existing user bases and traffic advantages, this model helps these games quickly gain users on Telegram and revitalize. It not only reduces market promotion costs for new projects but also significantly increases the success rate, allowing once-popular games to find new life in a new ecosystem.
Meme Incubation: Comprehensive Promotion from Community to Market
The Meme incubation model is an extension of traffic selling and joint operations, combining the functions of launchpads and DEXs to provide a one-stop solution for Meme Coin projects from incubation to market promotion. Blum is a successful case of this model, with 20 million Telegram channel users. Through Binance Labs’ MVP program, Blum successfully promoted multiple Meme Coin projects on social platforms and in the crypto market. This model utilizes Telegram’s powerful social network and TON’s blockchain technology, enabling emerging Meme projects to quickly attract community attention, gain initial traffic, and ultimately achieve trading on DEXs. It not only promotes Meme culture but also provides opportunities for investors and community members to participate in innovative projects.
4. Advertising Revenue
Telegram’s new TON-based advertising revenue model brings new profit opportunities for public channel owners. Channel owners can receive 50% of advertising revenue, paid in Toncoin (TON), the cryptocurrency of the TON blockchain. For channels that find it difficult to monetize directly, especially educational and entertainment channels, this model undoubtedly provides more space for developing quality content. Additionally, Telegram offers the Telegram Star program, allowing channel or bot owners to place ads through the Telegram advertising platform and pay for ads using Stars from their channel or bot account balance, enjoying discounts of up to 30%. This provides channel owners with a more cost-effective way to attract new users, further enhancing the exposure and growth potential of their channels or bots.
Summary – Reflections on Telegram Traffic and Web3 Growth
As Telegram’s user base continues to grow, traffic selling and joint operation incubation models show enormous potential in the Telegram + TON ecosystem. In the future, these models may further integrate AI and big data analysis technologies to improve the accuracy of traffic matching and marketing effectiveness. Meanwhile, as the TON ecosystem develops, the combination of traffic selling and blockchain technology will bring more innovative business models, helping projects stand out in a competitive market.
Within the Web3 ecosystem, the most critical issue currently is how to acquire new users and traffic, rather than relying solely on narratives. As long as enough users can be attracted, strong traffic itself can drive the formation of narratives, with Meme culture being one of the largest sources of traffic and narratives. Just as with the analogy of natural and synthetic diamonds, while Pepe as a natural representative of Meme culture has unique value, carefully designed and marketed synthetic Memes can create equally valuable assets.
These trends indicate that Telegram, as a platform for traffic monetization, possesses great flexibility and diversity, offering rich business opportunities for project developers and investors. By effectively utilizing these traffic monetization models, project teams can achieve rapid growth in a short time and meet expected business goals.
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