Written by: TechFlow
One of the hottest public chains this year, TON, seems to have gone a bit quiet recently.
Backed by Telegram's user base of over a billion, the traffic that has attracted many envious eyes, attracting countless people to build projects and farm on it.
But after several ecosystem projects went live, people started to question the quality of Telegram's traffic.
Poor user quality, too many bots/farming parties, are the most common complaints we hear.
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The end result is that the exchange effect between projects is not good, or as a new project that wants to grow, its advertising effect is also not good.
Is Telegram's traffic not real? What are better growth methods? Is Telegram/TON worth investing in?
This article will try to analyze the effective path for growth on Telegram/TON from the perspective of Telegram's recent development.
Telegram + Wallet, the Pandora's box of business potential has been opened
Telegram's inner demon, many users but poor user quality?
First of all, it is undeniable that Telegram's traffic is large. From the current data, by 2024, Telegram's global user base will exceed 700 million, and it currently has 950 million monthly active users, making it the third largest traffic entry after Google and Facebook.
*Charts From Statista
But from a commercial perspective, Telegram is just getting started.
First, Telegram has launched a paid subscription service, providing users with more advanced features and customization options.
In addition, they are also generating revenue through advertising placements in channels and groups, which can be targeted based on user interests and behaviors, which is currently Telegram's main business model.
However, this commercialization process also faces some challenges, such as:
Due to the diversity and anonymity of its user base, it is difficult to establish accurate user profiles, making precise ad targeting complex.
Telegram has always touted its focus on privacy and ad-free experience as a selling point, so how to commercialize without compromising the user experience is an important issue.
Based on the above problems, whether it is traffic owners (groups with large Telegram traffic, such as a large group owner or an application with many users) or advertisers (those who want to advertise on Telegram, such as project parties), they may be at a loss when facing such a huge traffic base.
So the question becomes, there is traffic here, but how to utilize the traffic is a problem that needs to be broken through.
And wallets, Mini apps may gradually change this situation.
Wallet-driven Mini app explosion, Telegram's user profile becomes clearer
First, we need to clarify two concepts: Telegram Wallet and Telegram Mini Apps.
Telegram Wallet: Telegram Wallet is a feature developed by Telegram, which was previously abandoned, but later developed by the TON community and announced by Telegram in September 2023 to integrate Telegram Wallet, supporting transactions of cryptocurrencies such as TON.
Telegram Mini Apps: Telegram Mini Apps were officially launched in April 2023. These applications allow developers to create and run web-based applications within Telegram.
Although Telegram Mini Apps were launched earlier, it was not until the launch of Telegram Wallet that the use and development of Mini Apps really exploded. Although there is no official data to support it, due to the Wallet providing more convenient payment and transaction functions, this will attract more users to use Mini Apps for shopping, payment and other activities.
For example, just like the recent TOKEN 2049, the mini app launched by TON and TADA, which allows users to directly book rides through Telegram, and the app currently shows that its monthly active users exceed 2.8 million.
The number of Mini Apps is still growing, and it is with the further popularization of Mini Apps, users can choose more types of applications, such as crypto games, ride-hailing applications, etc. This makes Telegram's user profile more diversified and clearer.
Through this rich application ecosystem, Telegram will be able to better understand user needs and label users.
Once users can be labeled, Telegram's marketing potential is unlocked.
Telegram's Google Ads/Guangdiantong
As mentioned earlier, Telegram's current main revenue streams are paid subscription services and group advertising services. And when user labels become more concrete, we come to the familiar Web2 traffic placement logic, similar to Google ads and Tencent's Guangdiantong.
Google Ads and Tencent Guangdiantong are advertising platforms that perform precise ad placement based on user data and behavior.
Google Ads analyzes users' search habits, browsing history, and geographic location, among other information, to provide targeted advertising services for advertisers.
Tencent Guangdiantong utilizes the huge user base of Tencent's social networks, combined with users' social behavior, interests and usage habits, to conduct precise ad placement.
Advertisers can set ads based on specific keywords and target audiences, thereby improving the conversion rate and return on investment of the ads, in order to achieve better marketing results.
As Telegram's user labels become more enriched, Telegram will also generate more similar business development opportunities. Through accurate user profiling, Telegram can provide advertisers with more efficient advertising placement solutions, attracting more brands and businesses to cooperate.
However, Telegram has not officially launched an advertising placement platform similar to Google Ads or Guangdiantong.
At the same time, Telegram also has a natural special feature: since Telegram Wallet natively supports cryptocurrency payments, many mini apps actually allow users to directly interact with cryptocurrencies and Web3 applications.
Therefore, we not only need to find a traditional third-party platform to support the construction of Telegram's advertising ecology, but also a platform that can combine with Web3, in order to help advertisers effectively place ads on Telegram.
Web2 + Web3, making traditional traffic flow effects better
Making Telegram ads as effective as WeChat
First, we need to clearly define that advertising and growth are actually quite broad terms, covering many types, such as creativity, operations, etc. The direction discussed in this article is mainly about Telegram's ad placement.
In the traditional ad placement field, there are mainly the following modules:
DSP (Demand-Side Platform): The system used by advertisers to purchase ad inventory/placements. Advertisers can bid in real-time and select the ad placements that best fit their target audience.
SSP (Supply-Side Platform): Provides publishers with tools to manage their ad inventory. It connects to multiple DSPs to enable real-time bidding on ad placements.
Attribution: The process of tracking user behavior to evaluate ad effectiveness. By analyzing data, advertisers can understand the performance of different ad channels and optimize their strategies.
Ad Network: An ad network is an intermediary that connects advertisers and publishers. It aggregates ad inventory from multiple publishers and offers it to advertisers for centralized purchasing. Ad networks typically provide a range of ad formats and placement options.
Image source: Network
In the complex ecosystem of Web2 advertising, while the synergistic effects of various modules have improved the efficiency and precision of ad placement, traditional advertising still faces some critical issues.
Black-box operations: In the bidding process, advertisers and traffic providers have very low transparency into the entire process, making it difficult for them to clearly understand the specifics of the bidding.
Fake traffic issue: Although attribution tools can help analyze the effectiveness of ad campaigns and provide some insights, the existence of fake traffic remains a serious challenge.
In fact, there are already some projects in Web3 that are similar to the traditional advertising domain, such as Spindl and Addressable in the figure below, which are attribution platforms built based on the on-chain behavioral habits of Web3 users; Coinzilla, an aggregator of traffic sources from various crypto applications.
But given the unique properties of Telegram, what needs to be achieved is to connect the user tags of Web2 and Web3 to better "define Telegram users", and that's why we found OpenAD, the first decentralized platform that realizes the integration of Telegram on-chain and off-chain data/tags.
OpenAD, the first decentralized platform that integrates Telegram on-chain and off-chain tags
I first learned about this project from a friend, who told me that the advertising results they achieved through OpenAD were more than twice as good as directly buying ads on Telegram.
How does OpenAD do it?
In general, OpenAD uses innovative ways to embed various types of ads (banner ads, interactive ads, etc.) into mini apps, allowing your ads to be effectively exposed in different scenarios.
In this process, OpenAD acts as an intermediary, connecting advertisers and publishers.
Image source: Offline event sharing
It may sound similar to traditional practices, but in fact, OpenAD has the following key features:
1- Tagging mini app users
OpenAD performs fine-grained user tagging through data analysis and user behavior tracking. For example, it collects information such as browsing history, click-through rates, and usage duration in mini apps, analyzes user interests, preferences, and behavioral patterns, and ultimately builds detailed user profiles/tags.
2- Combining Web3 to make advertising more transparent and prevent fraud
OpenAD's ad placement does not set up incentive mechanisms, avoiding scraping users, and ensuring that ad placement and triggering are based on real user activity. The ad system design also increases the difficulty and cost of bot users, automated operations, and Sybil attacks. Additionally, by integrating with Web3, user activities in OpenAD ads are periodically recorded and uploaded to the blockchain, allowing advertisers and publishers to transparently trace the ad data.
3- Forming an efficient traffic network with traffic providers, with no user overlap
OpenAD has established cooperative relationships with multiple industry traffic providers (such as multiple high-traffic project parties), forming an efficient traffic network. At the same time, traffic providers can also integrate their traffic resources into the OpenAD network, forming an exchange alliance, turning the original 1v1 BD exchange relationship into a 1vN relationship, achieving better results.
This will bring new changes to both the traffic providers and advertisers, which are important for ad placement.
For advertisers, they previously could not distinguish user quality when purchasing ads, had low selectivity, and might encounter fake traffic; for traffic providers, they wanted to monetize their traffic but had difficulty finding clients, and if they directly embedded ads in their products, they were concerned about affecting the existing user experience.
With the integration of platforms like OpenAD, the experience of the entire ecosystem will be completely transformed.
From the official website, we can see that as an advertiser, BananaTV, based on the high-quality user placement of OpenAD, has achieved an overall user interaction rate of up to 60% and a retention rate of 10%; while as a traffic provider, NOTON can earn higher revenue by selling its traffic slots.
Currently, OpenAD is also launching a one-month traffic incentive campaign, the details of which can be found at the official link:
Mutually Empowering with Web3, the Telegram Advertising Ecosystem Will Thrive
The evolution of the advertising ecosystem is inseparable from technological progress. As a rapidly growing social platform, Telegram is also actively exploring the integration with Web3 technology, which will undoubtedly drive the thriving development of its advertising ecosystem.
Compared to other platforms, Telegram has unique characteristics, but this does not mean that Telegram will be isolated from other ecosystems.
Just like the Web3 growth-related projects mentioned earlier, OpenAD, as an emerging advertising platform, can not only be limited to Telegram's traffic in the future, but also integrate data from other platforms. This cross-platform integration allows advertisers to make precise placements across a wider user base. Through projects like OpenAD, Telegram can also form a complementary relationship with other social media and applications, and can better understand user interests and behaviors to build a rich advertising ecosystem infrastructure.
By combining with Web3, Telegram can provide users with richer application scenarios and interactive experiences. When using mini apps, users can see ads related to their interests, further enhancing the effectiveness and interactivity of the ads.
The multi-dimensional cooperation of Telegram + Mini App + Web3 is expected to make the future of Telegram's advertising ecosystem even more prosperous.
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