[RFC] Balancer Marketing Analysis

Authors: Mui, Lamentations (Aura Finance contributors)

Over recent months, we have been speaking with a variety of stakeholders in the Balancer ecosystem, inclusive of Orb, the Balancer Maxis, and partner protocols. It has been both implicitly implied and explicitly said that official Balancer channels can often lack a cohesive narrative, leading to fragmentation and a lack of understanding about Balancer itself.

Despite significant strides in Balancer’s technology and market adoption, it has also become clear that the protocol has largely fallen out of the public stream of consciousness.

As key developments such as cross-chain gauges roll out, it is quite important that all stakeholders are aligned and understand the value of the protocol.

We believe Balancer is moving in the right direction. With strong marketing and understanding of Balancer’s benefits versus competitors, we think the protocol can more easily act on its great potential.

Specification

Because Balancer has so many moving parts, it’s important that everyone has a say, no matter what Balancer marketing and branding looks like in the future.

As a brief exercise and to kickstart this discussion, over recent months we created some notes internally about what Balancer marketing could improve on, along with a mood board / templates of what we think Balancer visuals could pivot toward.

To start, our high-level notes on what we think could be done better, ranked in order of what we see as valuable:

  1. Cohesive visual style: Take a brief look at this link and it becomes clear that Balancer marketing lacks a single visual style. The use of so many different aesthetics is not only relatively expensive (streamlining visuals will reduce spend on design), but also jarring for those trying to learn more about Balancer.
  2. Promote and simplify Balancer’s tech stack: Between 80/20 pools, LBPs, boosted pools, and more, Balancer’s tech stack is actually quite useful emissions aside—something many other DEXes probably cannot say themselves. By hammering home and simplifying the benefits of these pool types through case studies and informational threads, Balancer has an opportunity to more organically attract high-quality users.
  3. Leverage partner brands (co-marketing): Balancer’s ecosystem is quite diverse with high-quality partners that sport large communities. We don’t think there has been enough effort to be more meaningful with co-marketing
  4. Aligning marketing with other contributors: It sometimes appears as if the informational rails between marketing, business development, and the tech sides of Balancer are neither smooth nor fully operational. Aura contributors have found success more closely aligning marketing with BD and protocol strategy to be more targeted with content and co-marketing. This has helped to create a narrative around Aura (e.g. with the recent LSD push), while also allowing us to publish content faster.
  5. Keeping in touch with market trends: Tangential to the last point, Aura found a lot of its recent marketing success by posting content relevant to market trends (LSDs, cross-chain). We’re not saying that the marketing contributors should be ‘bandwagoners’, but they should be easily able to pivot and create quality content relevant to both Balancer and the trend to keep the protocol in the public eye at all times.
  6. Brand guidelines: Balancer can probably benefit from creating easily accessible brand guidelines for partners, along with for contributors internally, to ensure that all content has a similar feel and vision. This has helped us a lot with Aura marketing contributors.

Speaking more on this first point, we created a draft brand / visual recommendation guide that we think Balancer marketing contributors could explore.

We were specifically inspired by the zen aesthetic implied by Balancer’s logo of three stacked stones. As this is just a draft, we are missing some components to flesh it out further (including isometric totems that we think can fit within every post), though the idea is that the sand clouds and mountains/rocks are fungible, and thus each post can have a slightly different look while maintaining the same visual theme.

https://www.figma.com/file/nPJUMp1gSWk976fbWlSv3d/Balancer-Brand-Recommendation-(Aura%2C-Mar-2023)?node-id=1%3A21&t=sUeTFZWCws06sz5l-1

Whatever the visuals end up looking like, we think a move toward a cohesive design will be a big boon for the protocol and also reduce the headache marketing contributors have as it will make the content pipeline more efficient.

This post is meant to start a conversation about the future of Balancer marketing and branding. We welcome more discussion about the topic in the comments of this post!

21 Likes

Wow, these new visuals look amazing–great work!

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There is unfortunately a clear lack of visual identity in the Balancer brand. And this is really a pity because the logo and the name could easily be exploited in this sense.
About the post, the visuals provided are really awesome, they show a clear brand identity and they could help Balancer regain the visibility it has lost over time to its peers.

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Probably one of the best posts this forum has ever seen. Your six points are spot on but said far better and more concisely than I could :slight_smile:

I’ve seen many takes on Balancer’s brand in the 3 years I’ve been in the community and I have to say this zen garden aesthetic completely blows my mind. I’m kicking myself that I never considered this angle to it. It fits perfectly - keeps things on the serious side (which I think fits better for us vs a hard pivot), brings in the Asian theme which is very popular on CT, unique color palette vs competitors, keeps the stacked rocks and builds on it. Lots of potential for graphic design and narratives. patterns in the sand, building a balancer zen garden, etc.

I’m not much of a believer in DeFi marketing but this gets me excited about seeing these ideas in action.

13 Likes

This is literally the nicest thing I’ve ever seen you write, cough, cough, simp.

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Congrats @0xMui on a short, concise and inspiring first appearance on our forums. I agree with the others that I love the visual language and style. Clean and in harmony with Aura. Big respect! Excited for the times ahead!

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Thanks for sharing this @0xMui

I enjoyed our recent marketing session with the Orb & Beets teams. As you know, we are currently working on new, consistent graphical style across the brand and for social campaigns.

Re: Imagery & Overall concept

I think this Zen Garden concept is super strong. I’m a fan. I love the way it naturally incorporates the Balancer rocks in a tranquil environment. The patterns in the sand also lines up nicely how we’ve been thinking about applying harmonious / fractal natural patterns. It’s nice to have the tangential brand associations around the craftsmanship of creating such spaces, and the calmness and safety within. The harmonious relationship with the Aura brand is a bonus.

Re: Social graphics

I agree that we need to create a templates for repetitive social posts, and we certainly need a systematic approach. Your work here on Aura has been first class.

If I have to be critical (or at least, something for us to test): Are the social (e.g. the ‘Protocol update’) graphics a little too muted and muddy (which is obviously your intention with the sandy colors). I worry that people may not take as much notice while scrolling down their feeds without any vibrancy and muted contrast. Something that can be easily tweaked.


Overall, I’m inspired by the concept and would be happy to collaborate more to fine tune this direction. As mentioned, we’re also working on some other directions and I think it makes sense to bring them together for more community feedback.

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Great post @0xMui - I love seeing private conversations about brand that were happening behind closed doors and walled off to the community brought into the forum, as it should be with a DAO. Hopefully Aura and Beets can work with the existing contributors like Pon, Chun Li and Megan to streamline these processes and nail the brand. The brand will be in good hands!

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Nice overview!

I personally feel that we are lacking in explainers on how the balancer tech stack works, and in co-marketing initiatives. We simply don’t see Balancer on any Twitter spaces, for example. It is good to see that I’m not the only one feeling this way.

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This post highlights a lot of frustrations felt and expressed privately between other contributors for a long time, who have been unable to instigate change alone in the past due to various barriers.

I strongly support the need for a more cohesive brand aesthetic, as well as improved open discussions and collaborations between future SPs and contributors to energise and maintain a unified marketing approach. A more collaborative structure would also empower and leverage the skills of contributors fully compared to what has occurred previously.

The ecosystem that Aura and Balancer has, and continues to build, is imo, full of largely untapped opportunities for innovative and engaging co-marketing.

Having just returned from EthTokyo i’m loving the zen aesthetic idea. Just a personal viewpoint i would like a slightly more vibrant colour palette to be more eye-catching- even a single accent colour perhaps?

Excited for further discussions on moving forward!

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I can’t stress enough when cohesive visual style is essential and the proposed direction for the new style is great.

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Love the ideas and direction too. Thanks so much @0xMui and Aura team for taking the time to prepare this. Really appreciate it.

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Well it is hard for me not to like us going in a zen direction, so i look forward to that gaining traction. I appreciate the effort of anyone advancing Balancer’s position so thank you to you and your team. I obviously think the Balancer tech is robust and unique for LPs to join the ecosystem for reasons that no other AMM can offer. If we can convey this in the even keeled way you propose i am all for it.

Some ideas on the topic of zen we may be able to incorporate:

  1. Enso circles are simple, calming, and can depict pool ratios or fill graphic backgrounds.
  2. Bamboo showing resilience, such as the 80/20 LP strategy - which i think you have in your figma
  3. Adopting anecdotal posts to increase engagement within reason, threads / storytelling have been great lately.
  4. Embodying a more mindful / stoich corner for Defi users. I think we want people to feel seasoned and intelligent using Balancer/Aura as opposed to short term high APR types. I do not think we have many of these LPs now, but leveraging it as our style can be useful.

Whether these ideas are used or not I am not offended at all, just happy if it helps anyone in improving our reach at all.

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First off, a note of appreciation for all the work put into this post and the enthusiasm exhibited in the comments. A strong sense of passion for the Balancer brand and the success of the ecosystem at large is something we all clearly share, and it’s encouraging to see.

Balancer has grown rapidly over time, which in and of itself presents a number of challenges for an expanding team. The teams involved in these efforts have helped to grow Balancer into what it is today, and it is precisely because of this effort that we stand on a foundation to improve upon. A huge thank you.

“The key is to fail, learn, and improve quickly. If you’re constantly learning and improving, your evolutionary process will be ascending. I believe that evolving is life’s greatest accomplishment and its greatest reward. " ― Ray Dalio

The Beethoven X Team

Over the past 3 months, the Beethoven X team has engaged in a service provider role that has primarily focused on the technical development for the Balancer ecosystem. Over this time, we have also engaged in marketing efforts with Orb. In this context, the goal was to start to provide support in a couple of key areas:

  • Developer Landing Page
  • Content and Education
  • Social Media Presence

In light of the current structures in place at Orb Co. our strategy was to come in with respect for the efforts being made internally and to begin to provide support and guidance to the areas we feel that we have strong expertise.

As most are aware, the pressures to execute and provide meaningful change in the domain of marketing have reached a critical mass. In this regard, the points shared by Mui in the opening post stand as a great starting framework for this evolution. We agree with many of the statements made and would like to share our thoughts / conceptual work on the development of the Balancer brand.

Although change may be necessary, it is still something we feel needs to be treated with care and respect. Moving quickly has its advantages, especially in an environment such as Crypto, but more important is moving with skill.

The long-term success of the brand is our highest aspiration and this maxim has guided much of the groundwork we have made regarding furthering marketing efforts.

Marketing Synergy

Over the past 2 months, we have worked closely with Balancer’s lead designer, built rapport with major contributors within the ecosystem, and spent time with thought leaders in the space. The major objective here was to become intimately connected to the teams that are driving Balancer’s development, as well as become intimately aligned with the core values driving Balancer’s product vision.

As a friendly fork that has a proven track record, we are also uniquely positioned in the sense that there are very few teams that have as in-depth an understanding of the underlying technology driving Balancer innovation as we do.

We have lived and breathed Balancer for the past 18 months and believe we are capable of taking the Balancer brand to unexplored heights.

Marketing Strategy

The focus of our marketing efforts has been centred around producing high-quality educational content on the underlying technology, as well as cultivating an ethos of care and compassion for our community. Combining a strong visual aesthetic with an approachable brand identity has allowed our content, voice and style to flourish.

Beyond education, content is also an invaluable tool when it comes to building, maintaining and developing an engaged community. Community is key for longevity and a diverse set of content forms is one of the best ways to build this relationship. Our strategy leverages a framework that entangles synergy between users and content.


The user journey and the content journey are intimately entangled. With the right strategy in place, synergy between these pathways creates a positive growth flywheel that amplifies the marketing efforts across the ecosystem.

The Content Journey (Bottom Up): It is our responsibility to provide quality content for our users in a simple, easy-to-understand manner. This core content creates the backbone for the rest of our communication strategy - it trickles into every aspect of our brand marketing and sets the tone for our ecosystem.

User journey (Top Down): A brand needs to provide more than just a product and education - it needs to provide channels that allow users to engage and grow. From social media platforms, live events, and ambassador programs, the aim is to have “satellite” content that grabs user attention and initiates them into the user journey. As satellite content, Twitter is the number one column to share and market existing material.

Community: In between these pathways lies the community. The community is the heart and soul of the brand and is our most treasured resource. Satellite content pulls individuals into the community and fosters engagement. Long-form content creates competency and builds cohesive communities.

Synergy: The content funnel aims to create synergy between all of the working components - a growth flywheel that extends to all parts of the ecosystem. Content is designed to be repurposed and readily available for users to share. Furthermore, the community is encouraged to become brand ambassadors, feeding back into the cycle of curation and awareness.

Key Takeaways

  1. Education is a prerequisite for the expansion of any endeavour. Education fuels innovation, innovation fuels adoption, and adoption fuels growth. As Balancer expands in its product vision, the demographics to which its products cater also change. Innovation can continue on its trajectory but without skillfully communicating what Balancer is, how it works, and who it is for, the growth of Balancer’s community and larger market adoption will always stagnate.

  2. The community lies at the core of Web 3. It has become more and more apparent that DeFi is not just about catering to the financial needs of a particular demographic. We are evolving as a species and the decentralized revolution speaks to the hearts of many who aspire for more. Deeper connections, fulfilment, progression, evolution, and belonging, to name just a few, are all hugely important factors to take into consideration when developing a brand for the future.

  3. Vision and purpose trump hype. While followers, retweets and likes are effective, we believe embodying a core product vision is the number one priority. As part of the Balancer ecosystem, we have been incredibly fortunate to work alongside all of the contributors here and share a collaborative vision for a better future in Defi. Excited by this premise, our overarching marketing strategy aims to inspire the collective web3 community to become as passionate about the Balancer ecosystem as we all are.

  4. The visual aesthetic and brand voice are essential components that make every notable brand stand out. Alignment around these two crucial factors allows the brand to cement itself as recognizable and professional. Ensuring Balancer embodies a professional visual image with a relevant and knowledgeable voice is a core focus of our strategy. This defines what Balancer is, who the brand appeals to and where the ecosystem is heading.

Proof of Concept

At its core, the Balancer brand has a massive amount of potential in terms of visual expression. We have worked closely with Pon to begin to explore the potential direction for brand development, we have conducted 10 interviews with core Balancer contributors to align around product visions and core technological innovations, created over 10 mood boards for visual and brand exploration, built a landing page flow, developed an evolving content and visual strategy; and built a framework to establish a succinct brand voice and identity.

Mood boards

We strongly agree with Mui’s post that an alignment around visual identity and graphics allow the brand to cement itself as both uniquely recognizable as well as professional; this is a critical aspect of Balancer’s growth. To date, we have explored and mapped out 10 different potential profiles that could Balancer could encapsulate.

These concepts range from Taoism, quantum mechanics, and modular and composable infographics to elemental, mycelial, and cyberpunk-inspired revolutions. The scope for design is endless but at the core, we want to embody a brand that is future-oriented, highly relevant, and based on authenticity.

Our goal has been to include contributors throughout this process and ensure the soul of Balancer is embodied in the final product. We have so far worked closely with Pon and would love to open the contribution and input to Balancer Maxis as well as core contributors.

Voice and style

Building from a foundation of insightful content and a unique aesthetic, the final piece of the puzzle is the voice that Balancer presents itself with. As a thought leader in the industry, the goal for the Balancer voice is to showcase competency but above all relevancy through social media outlets in a knowledgeable, playful, engaging manner.

Curating content that speaks from a DeFi native point of view is key. Engaging with current Defi narratives to accentuate the major benefits that Balancer unlocks, as well as building excitement around current innovation will be the major focus for social media. The specific voice that Balancer would embody comes down to more than just knowledge and relevancy, to explore the potential options we constructed a Balancer profile flow task that pulls key visions, concepts, design visuals, characterisation and then finally sample campaigns.

Content strategy

Our strategy for Twitter has been to take a more conservative approach to visuals/design. We want to operate from a humble space and slowly integrate our style over time. Just as Balancer is a baselayer for AMM and technical innovation, we believe Balancer as a brand is a baselayer for creative innovation. We should first cement a standard of relevant and engaging content with sleek design visuals, iterations would then slowly unfold that build off of this base layer. Building an aligned, professional, and relevant foundation first is key, but we have also explored potential storylines and characterizations that Balancer could grow into. Below is one example of this flow.

Current Examples

Outlined below are some examples of the content and the visual baselayer we have started building. A cadence of informative content with sleek visuals should be evident before exploring how visual identity can grow further. Again, the importance of starting small, developing consistency and expanding over time is key.

https://twitter.com/Balancer/status/1651269967118225408?s=20

https://twitter.com/Balancer/status/1651820160729358336?s=20

https://medium.com/balancer-protocol/inside-balancer-contracts-a-composable-symphony-1-229f6e90224

Closing remarks

There is a rich history to the Balancer ecosystem we have all come to cherish. It is a project that has evolved through many iterations and in many respects done so way ahead of its time. Balancer champions innovation in a decentralized world and has achieved its current state of success through the cumulative efforts of many talented, hard-working individuals. It has been a team effort.

It is this sentiment that speaks the loudest. Success is a collaborative effort and building a foundation of support, care, and passion is hugely important for the long-term success of a brand.

How we choose to present ourselves moving forward should be a representation of our collective. It should pay homage to the roots of its foundation as well as encapture the inspiration for a brighter future.

We look forward to collaborating with everyone as we step into the next phase of Balancer’s evolution. It has been a pleasure to contribute thus far and we have no doubt that if we work together, we can bring to fruition the dreams we all share for Balancer’s growth and more.

It is up to you to define your own piece in this shared network, and to realize that such personally meaningful work is done best in a relationship.”-Kernel

With love,

Vee, Jedi and Naly

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Thank you @0xMui and @naly for the amazing assessment and great first-time posts! It was a pleasure to read through all of it.

I can speak for the community contributors (even those who never got a chance to really onboard the ecosystem) that we welcome a clear communication strategy. We might have fallen short in the past using multiple sources of contribution without an aligned vision on both aesthetics and voice, leading to too many criticisms and failures.

Loving what you guys are bringing to the table so far and looking forward to working closer!

As for my first input, I see the color palettes either have no color (@0xMui plain/gray) or are using a very similar scheme from Beethoven (@naly neon green/pink). Are you planing to ditch the current color pallet? If so, how is that going to transition? Not that I’m married to those colors, they are very hard to work with from what I gather, but it would be best if we carry our own identity.

A link of the current color palette for reference: https://www.figma.com/file/7NXoQx3GBtTRiL4tOrFPLr/Balancer-Brand-(Public)?node-id=1%3A80&t=Ji2uRyc4zdlc9ARv-0

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Great to meet you and thanks for your insight here.

The above mood boards were to explore the potential brand direction and are at this point just exploratory. Working closely with the current design team will be the major priority to ensure we are as brand-aligned as possible. Respecting the current brand color scheme is something we intend to do from the beginning and will only make changes from this if it is agreed upon unanimously.

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Thanks for the kind words, Danko!

We are very excited to work closely with all of you; creating a foundation for community-created content is a pivotal part of our strategy, and we are spoilt for choice at Balancer!

Another point on colour palettes, two of the Tweets embedded in the original post weren’t our specific design visuals. The plan is to keep visuals minimal while respecting the current colour scheme. I have edited the post to only include tweets that we have both written content and designed the visuals for. I have attached both below.

https://twitter.com/Balancer/status/1651820160729358336?s=20
https://twitter.com/Balancer/status/1651269967118225408?s=20

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