Zeneca, Founder and CEO of ZenAcademy and The 333 Club, and Jaime Schmidt, Co-Founder of BFF and Founder of Schmidt’s Naturals, joined us to discuss how they started and grew their niche in Web2 and Web3.
Founder and CEO of ZenAcademy and The 333 Club Zeneca
I was trading some NFTs and I was tracking the floor prices of my own collection just in a little Google Sheet. And one of my friends once said, “It would be great if there was a way to look at the floor price of collections,” because that just didn't exist back then. Then I was like “OK, well maybe let me just tweet it out." I had a Twitter account with I don't know how many followers, 1,000, maybe 2,000, if that. And I thought, let's see what people think, maybe it's going to help others. And it just immediately had this viral reaction where people just really loved it. I just kept doing it for about six months and really just went crazy. It wasn’t an intentional thing where I was saying how can I build a following or what niche can I fit or fill? I was doing this thing and I just had been tweeting for two or three months and nothing really took off. And this was the thing that took off. Dumb luck maybe.
BFF Co-Founder and Founder of Schmidt’s Naturals Jaime Schmidt
For me it was similar. Nothing took off for me in terms of a career path that I was excited about. I had been working my way up the corporate ladder, finding myself in a career path that just didn't feel right. I decided to get my hands dirty, try and just put things on pause for a while and thought it'll come to me if it's meant to be. And then I got pregnant and I took an interest in natural products. Natural deodorant is not something I had been passionate about my whole life. I didn't grow up thinking that's what I want to do when I'm older, but being pregnant made me more intentional about what I was putting on my skin. I definitely didn't intend on building much of a brand at that point. But once someone starts validating what you're doing, similar to what Zeneca was saying, that's what really got me started. My desire to build this into a business because people were saying this works, I want more, can I get it other fragrances. I think when you're building a niche, once that one person validates you, that's when things really start to take off. So unintentionally and intentionally I think is definitely a big part of it.
Founder and CEO of ZenAcademy and The 333 Club Zeneca
Web3 and NFTs are a niche in itself. There's so many people out there that hate us. Within this little bubble, within Web3 and within NFTs and within crypto, you can find your group of people and your communities and it's generally rosy. But if we look at it from a macro lens, and especially last year when the bull market was going crazy, there was a lot of just general hate against NFTS and crypto… As soon as you step out of this crypto Twitter bubble or whatever it is, you start to see that. And so definitely realizing that was a big wake up call when I realized, “Oh wait, most of the world hates us.” And then within the space itself, I think I've been fairly fortunate that I haven't really had a lot of criticism or hate or anything like that, but there's certainly been some. And that's like an inevitable part of just being a human in a community that's large and especially as you have a lot of followers, like some percentage of people are just not going to gel or like what you're doing and and have some reason to be against it. But I've been pretty fortunate in the NFT and Web3 space.
BFF Co-Founder and Founder of Schmidt’s Naturals Jaime Schmidt
As much as I care about a resume and an interview, I think it's just so hard to really gauge resumes and skill sets. They don't mean as much to me anymore. Sometimes you don't know how someone's going to do until they're in the door. We've had turnover at BFF. I think every Web3 project or brand has seen people come and go and what remains is this really strong team of true believers and people who were meant to be with you along your journey.
If you're looking for a job in Web3, the best advice I could probably give you is don't be afraid to reach out if there's a company or a project you're interested in being a part of. Shoot them a DM, definitely shoot your shot. You have nothing to lose.
Founder and CEO of ZenAcademy and The 333 Club Zeneca
I'm a huge fan of having smaller interactions with people because it's just more meaningful in both directions. Whether it's a one-on-one call or AMA or a Twitter Space or a group chat with 10, 20, 50 people. But in terms of doing this as things scale, how do you stay on top of it? It's something I struggled with at a certain point. And I think there's this tipping point basically where you just realize that you just literally can't reply to everyone. And I would try and try and try for ages and then like every day I'd be drowning trying to get on top of my DMs. And it was even as simple as wanting to at least reply to people and say thank you for sending a message. But if I were to reply to every DM, every comment, every email and stuff, there would be like 5-6 hours a day just doing that. And so it's about allocating and dedicating an appropriate amount of time.
BFF Co-Founder and Founder of Schmidt’s Naturals Jaime Schmidt
Never make assumptions about who your audience or community or customer is. You might have an idea. You, of course, have your target person that you are marketing to or you're trying to rally into your community. But don’t close off groups that don't necessarily or haven't historically resonated with what you're doing. I think that's so key. No matter what you're building in Web2 or Web3, just know that your customer base or community base is bigger than it might seem at face value.
For more tips and insights, listen to the full conversation with Zeneca and Jaime here
This is not financial advice. If you don't want to spend money investing in crypto or Web3 — you don’t have to. The intent of this article is to help others educate themselves and learn.
