Matt Bertram is the head of strategy at EWR Digital. He sat down with Jessica Abo to discuss how to prepare your brand for Web 3.0 marketing.
Jessica Abo: Matt, what is Web 3.0 and how did we get here?
Matt Bertram: Web 1.0 was 1990 to say 2005, 2006. Basic websites, HTML, just now starting to get like payments going. The rise of social media changed the world, where really the problem started, where they started to monetize our data. Web 3.0 is really the next layer of the internet. It’s going to be ubiquitous. Everyone, every device, every application. Think of what Starlink’s doing, wrapping the whole world in wifi, the internet of things, everything’s going to be connected together. AR, IR, the metaverse, NFTs, decentralized applications, blockchains. AI’s going to have a place. Decentralized web, where everything again is ubiquitous.
Let me break it down in maybe a practical comparison to just break down some of the tenants. Let’s use Twitter, for example. Twitter, right now, it can be censored. They can shut down your payments. So it’s permission based. If you want to interact with them, you have to give them all your personal data. And then it’s centralized. It’s one set server that if that goes down, everything goes down. Web 3.0 is uncensorable. They can’t shut down. Something like Condor, it goes back to federated social media, where it’s peer to peer. You can’t be shut down. It’s completely encrypted. It’s permissionless, so you can pay anyone directly. No one’s going to stop you from doing that. It’s decentralized. The internet was the fastest growing technology in all recorded history. It has grown out about 63% a year, year over year. Blockchain’s growing out about 113% a year. So double the rate of the internet. In four to five years at this pace, half the world’s going to be on blockchain.
Related: The Blockchain Is Everywhere: Here’s How to Understand It
And what role do you think blockchain will play in Web 3.0 marketing?
Bertram: Web 3.0 marketing is so much more than just having a website or SEO or AdWords. It’s enhancing how you can interact from an advertising level and creating richer experiences to be able to interact with your customers with a lot more targeted ads, AI driven personalizations, and then really decentralization, that framework of information. That’s going to be reused, reshaped. You’re going to be able to take back your own data and you’re going to be able to monetize it yourself, or you’re going to be able to stay private if you want. It’s just going to be a better way to cooperate and work together.
What are your thoughts when it comes to Web 3.0 marketing and social media?
Bertram: Web 3.0 is building more meaningful relationships with your customers and is helping create partnerships that benefit everyone, not just the business, right? We’ve all heard if you’re not paying for the product, you are the product. So it’s time for businesses to stop thinking about customers as a number in a database, but more about people that are looking for a similar experience, product or value.
Related: Web 3.0 Is Coming, and Here’s What That Really Means for You
And in your opinion, how can companies prepare their brand for Web 3.0 marketing?
Bertram: Businesses should be highly user focused. They should be looking at UX, UI, how to interact online. They really need to enhance transparency and authenticity as we move into a decentralized structure. Users are going to be able to take more control of their data. It’s going to be more like you’re interacting with each other. Business owners, more secure data, more transparency, a lot of advantages there. And then think about content creation, not just blogs, maybe NFTs.
