My Grandmother is an ICO advisor too.

Who’s tired or everybody calling themselves an “ICO Advisor” or “expert”? Ok, so this article addresses those people who are trying to break into the ICO advisory game, and in hopes that it will reach some of you and teach you a few things about what an ICO really needs.

A year ago, if you had a following on LinkedIn or social media, that was enough to get you a job as an advisor. Today, the market is changing, people are getting to the point where they realize that it’s just not enough to bring traffic. What you need to provide is engagement.

Today’s social media tools can be leveraged into tools of engagement, and that is what ICO’s need.  Assuming the ICO is a legit ICO with a real dApp or service that provides a solution; and just like any other business, they need clients. While this article focuses on marketing advisors, the message applies to everyone. If you want to make yourself valuable to an ICO, start to learn about their business. Do some research and find out ways in which your natural talents can be helpful to them. Before contacting them, prepare your CV, maybe write a cover letter telling them specifically how you can help them, and then ask for a call.

There are many internet marketing tools out there that can be used by advisors to truly bring value and make you an asset to a company, most of these tools are not being used by ICO’s because they are too busy managing the business; this is a perfect opportunity for advisors to step in, create value, and get paid. But you must learn how to use these tools, you must first provide value, then comes the reward. So often I see people on LinkedIn advertising themselves as advisors and punting their services, but the unfortunate truth is that very few of them actually get hired, and what’s more, you actually are lowering your own worth when you use the “spray and pray” method of advertising. Here are some good ideas for advisors to strengthen their value proposition:

• Become knowledgeable on the core business of the ICO and write a few articles that relate to the business the ICO is in, then submit these articles to one of many online publications- it may take a while to get a response, but if the content is good, it will get published.
• Become proficient in one or two of the various IM (internet marketing) tools. You can create Facebook groups and build an audience, use Instagram to create followers, or use Twitter to build followers quite easily. Just make your tweets relevant and people will follow.
• Learn how to create a simple landing page that serves as a lead capture page, this can be done for almost free and anything you do to gain leads will be of great value to an ICO.
• Become friendly with some YouTubers and ask them if they will give you a discount for any clients you bring them. This is easy and once you have 3-4 influencers who you work with, you can then tell your ICO clients that you can get the interviews at a discounted rate- it’s a win-win for everyone.

The bottom line here is differentiate yourself, don’t become a member of the herd, that is what most people are doing right now and the landscape is starting to stink. Be smart about your branding, you could be very valuable to an ICO but if you don’t take the time to prepare, you will be no different than the hundreds of other ICO advisors out there. The secret is that there is no secret, like any other position, you must work hard to build your brand and deliver value. Once you have done that, you could see yourself with ICO’s approaching your left and right, because the bottom line is that we are in a growing industry where demand for the right people is strong.