Are you thinking about launching your own NFT project, but you aren’t sure what you need to do?
Well, this guide will show you the steps required to launch an NFT project on Solana, but a lot of the steps can be followed for any blockchain.
Collection or 1:1 Art?
There is a difference between launching a collection of 10,000 NFTs versus launching a 1:1 art piece.
This guide is going to focus on the collection.
With a 1:1 art piece there are some things you can do like show previews of the work, videos of you creating it, and helping understand when it’s going to be listed.
With an NFT collection you have an uphill battle of getting people’s attention as you’re going to be up against a lot of other NFT projects.
So what do you do?
How to Launch an NFT Project in 7 Steps
Unfortunately, I can’t guarantee you success with your NFT project because there are a lot of variables that aren’t going to be in your hands.
For example, you might think the art is great, but what if everyone else doesn’t?
You might be hitting up the influencers hoping for a plug, but if they don’t shout you out then do you have enough marketing in you to get the word out?
So what’s the point of this guide?
To make sure that you have a solid enough foundation to get yourself off on the right foot.
1. Appealing Art
Art is of course subjective and that’s why I don’t say “good art”.
The art has to appeal to a certain audience for it to even gain any traction.
Sure, you can get away with the world’s ugliest art if you pull out some other tricks, but for long-term sustainability you’ll want to make sure that your art is liked by people.
It doesn’t have to be the best art on the planet. In fact, you won’t be able to objectively tell if it is.
But you need to understand that your art is going to be compared to other projects.
Mix in the other factors like utility and community then you can see how important art is or isn’t to you project.
But art is always the first thing people see. It’s that first impression and if the first impression is off then that means there are a lot more things that you’ll need to overcome.
2. Build the Community
This is the most challenging part.
Why?
Because there are a million communities for people to join and starting a community from scratch can be pretty.
However, if you don’t have some type of community established then you might find it rough to get off the ground during mint time.
This means that you should start working on community as quickly as possible.
Community is the last thing on the checkbox. It should be the first and last thing.
Now, what makes a great community?
Don’t focus so much on the quantity but instead look at the quality.
Do you have amazing people talking about the project? Are they having a good time? Do they understand what you’re trying to do?
This is where you get to establish the foundation of your whole project so don’t fall into the trap of thinking that the best route for you is invite contests.
Take the time to talk to people. Get to know them. Let them know that you exist.
This is also a great opportunity to get feedback.
- Is supply too high/low?
- Is mint price too high/low?
- Is the art confusing?
- Are they missing the story?
- Do they want more utility?
And understand that community doesn’t have to be Discord. Maybe you focus heavy on Twitter or TikTok or YouTube.
Community is simply the collective people that feel they are a part of something.
3. Choose a Mint Date
This should be pretty solid and set in stone once it’s established.
People will continuously ask you when it is so if you don’t have an exact date then at the very least give a timeframe.
2nd half of December for example.
4. Marketing
Ooooo ‘marketing’. You might think it’s an evil word, but you have to get out there and market.
What does that mean exactly?
It’s simply making sure people know that you exist.
How do you do that?
There can be lots of ways to achieve that. Get on the sites that have mint calendars. Talk to influencers. Join in discussions on Twitter.
5. Mint Price
This one you can hold off for as long as possible but the sooner you know it the better.
However, environments change.
It might be a tough sell to ask for 1 Sol for example, but an easy one at 0.25.
Or maybe your projects get a lot of hype and that 0.5 Sol could’ve actually be 2 or 3.
Too many times I’ve seen projects set a hard mint price early on, not waver from it, and had an unsuccessful launch.
6. Set Up Your Website
You might think that websites are too 2.0 for you, but people still want to go and read things.
With Boopieverse, we had a website up on day 1 so people could go and read the story of Boopie.
This made many people interested in Boopie that didn’t want to first sign into Discord.
Your website can act as the best marketing tool that you have.
What should your website have?
- Story. What is the purpose of your NFTs?
- Common Questions
- Team. Anonymous or not let people know there is a team.
- Roadmap
- Minting information
7. Your Mint Site
When we first tried to launch Boopieverse I made a mistake of waiting until the last minute to get all of the minting set up.
It didn’t work.
Either time.
It wasn’t until the 3rd time when I had everything set up DAYS before minting that things went smoothly.
If you’re worried about bots finding your NFT and trying to access it there are a number of different things that you can do, but the easiest is to just set a high mint price.
If you’re using Candy Machine you can easily change it before Mint.