How to List and Sell Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) ?
Listing & selling is a critical stage for any Non-Fungible Token (NFT) project. NFTs are without question one of the hottest topics on the web right now. With so many projects competing for users attention and money, the process leading to listing and selling NFTs can mean the difference between success and failure.
In this article, let's look at the typical process required to launch a successful NFT sale.
In this article ....
Marketing & Building Communities
NFT List & Sale Process
A nonfungible token (NFT) could be anything - digital art, physical asset, song, tweet, video, meme, or pretty much anything - as long as someone is willing to pay for it. NFTs have become the craze recently and it's no wonder everyone seems to be jumping onto the bandwagon.
To stay differentiated in the crowd and successfully sell your NFTs, it's no longer enough to just create and list it on a marketplace. The entire sale process needs to be managed well from the start. While the details may vary from project to project , at a high-level the process for non-fungible token sale and listing is:
Marketing & Building Communities
Community building and marketing takes the cake for the NFT sale process. A vibrant community which believes in the project and the utility of the tokens is critical. The popular platforms for crypto/NFT communities are:
· Twitter
· Discord
· Telegram
· YouTube
Try to gain visibility as much as possible:
- Run invitation campaign on Discord (3 to 10 invites depending on how quick you want to WL people)
- Engage community to:
- Tweet about the project
- Retweet pinned tweets
- Create art or any contest form
- Subscribe to YouTube or other social channels.
Whitelisting
Whitelisting is a common practice in the NFT world. Whitelisting means a crypto wallet address (i.e., a public address), is pre-approved for minting of NFTs on specified dates/times (usually a date/time window).
Reasons for whitelisting:
- Guaranteed slots for early supporters/buyers to mint NFTs when the minting event happens
- Avoid “gas wars” when multiple people try to mint NFTs at the same time, driving up transaction prices
Further reading:
How to run Whitelist programs?
Getting whitelisted can take various forms. You can use platforms like Gleam or SweepWidget, or a simple Google Form to run the whitelist campaigns. Here are a couple of examples of NFT whitelist campaigns:
Rarity Tools shows the upcoming NFT projects and the whitelisting process.
Tip: Try to expand the whitelist database as much as possible :
- Collaborate with other projects and exchange whitelists of their communities.
- Run invitation campaign on Discord (3 to 10 invites depending on how quick you want to WL people)
Linking Whitelists to Minting
Once the whitelisted addresses are available, they can be mapped to the smart contracts, so the whitelisted address can mint during the minting event.
Further reading:
- https://dev.to/emanuelferreira/how-to-create-a-smart-contract-to-whitelist-users-57ki
- https://medium.com/@ItsCuzzo/using-merkle-trees-for-nft-whitelists-523b58ada3f9
- https://dev.to/lilcoderman/create-a-whitelist-for-your-nft-project-1g55
Tip: Usually whitelists are for the presale. However, the minting contract can be the same for both presale and public sale, with just separated function/features. The minting page can also be the same for both presale and public sale. This will save you some money, duplication, and management headaches.
NFT Minting
“Minting an NFT” is the act of publishing a unique instance of your NFT token on the blockchain. Minting can be:
- Private mint: For the whitelisted participants
- Public mint: For anyone
Minting can happen on:
NFT Revealing (Optional)
For new projects, the artwork won’t be revealed until the NFT is minted, and the buyer won’t know exactly what they get until after they buy it. The art only reveals itself after it’s purchased. It’s up to the creators behind the collection whether the reveal happens immediately, when the collection sells out, or with a delay of 24 or 48 hours, for example.
Reveal helps with:
- Create some additional hype (and mystery) around the project,
- Leaves the project team with some extra time to prepare additional marketing around the project and pushes any unsold inventory
- Gives additional time for people to mint in case they didn’t do earlier.
Further reading: https://techmoneyculture.com/23-nft-terms-you-need-to-know/
NFT Listing on Marketplace
The minted NFTs can be listed on marketplace such as OpenSea, Rarible, etc for sale. Listing can be done by:
- NFT promoter: For example, unsold NFTs or NFTs allocated for marketplace can be listed for minting and sale (see previous section for details)
- NFT buyers/owners: Users who bought NFTs (private or public sale) can list their NFT on open marketplace for sale. They need to connect the wallet, which holds the NFT, and follow the process for listing for sale.
NFT Rarity Listing
Once you have the NFT collection ready, you can rank the collection by rarity. One of the most common questions people ask in the discords of collectible NFT projects is ‘how rare is mine’. This is because rarity is one of the most important factors (if not the most important factor) in determining the value of an individual NFT.
Though not free, listing on the rarity sites can help gain the much-needed exposure initially.
Further reading:
Disclaimer
This is a research on the common and best practices for token sales and listing. The research doesn’t account for changed market conditions, platform, or network specific requirements. This is only intended to serve as a guide and readers are expected to do their own due diligence. This paper is for educational purposes only and not an investment or financial advice.