Summary
Proposal for Inverse Finance DAO to cover operations of the Growth Working Group (GWG) in Season 2, running for 6 months from November 1, 2024 to April 30, 2024.
About the GWG
The GWG is responsible for business development, marketing, design, community, and capital raising for the DAO while also engaging in day-to-day risk-related activities including serving on Fed Chair and Policy multisigs. The GWG today consists of one contributor, @patb, who brings deep experience in enterprise and consumer software marketing, business development, product development, and operations, including previous web3 marketing & business development experience at Index Coop.
Season 2 Lookback
Season 2 was an opportunity for the DAO and the GWG to build important partnerships, expand onto new chains, dive deeper into FiRM usability challenges, pursue multiple strategic growth initiatives, experiment with new user acquisition programs, and to continue to pursue all avenues for eliminating bad DOLA debt.
Business Development & Strategic Growth Initiatives
The GWG made important progress despite delays in releasing cross-chain sDOLA and sINV, impacting multiple Season 2 objectives:
- Objective: Close a minimum of three new DEX partnerships on emerging L2’s
- Result: we onboarded new DEX partners including Thruster, Fenix, and PancakeSwap while also getting liquidity wins with Anzen, Compound, and Zunami. We expanded our ecosystem of yield aggregators to include Baklava and Hyperlock.
- Objective: Close a minimum of three third party lending market partners.
- Result: we expanded onto Fraxlend, Llamalend, and Ethereum Credit Guild and saw our Gearbox and Compound deals delayed due to market conditions. Borrow activity on partner protocols was tepid largely due to overall weak demand for leverage.
- Objective: Present one new strategic growth proposal during Season 2.
- Results: GWG proposed an Inverse Points program aimed at enhancing product adoption. GWG also led due diligence on sister projects (e.g. USD2) though no formal proposal was brought to the DAO in Season 2.
- Objective: Close one new CEX partner.
- Result: we maintained a no-payment policy and did not close a CEX partner during Season 2.
- Objective: launch the Inverse Developer Partner Program with at least two grant applications.
- Result: we launched the program and our initial reference implementation partner delayed fixed rate rollout in order to launch a variable rate market. However, we gained insight into how partners might prefer to integrate a “white label” version of FiRM which informs the FiRM v2 feature set.
- Objective: identify a part-time resource or partner to help penetrate DAO Treasuries to close at least $500K in DOLA or sDOLA treasury diversification.
- Result: A potential part-time resource was identified however delays in enabling cross-chain sDOLA for prospects on L2’s pushes this effort to Season 3.
Marketing
GWG’s Season 2 marketing included important activities and accomplishments:
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Awareness:
- To remain competitive, awareness of Inverse and its products is in need of significant improvement. We operate in a noisy marketplace with multiple new and well-capitalized stablecoin entrants and we do so with a modest budget.
- X/Twitter. Our Season 2 budget required us to again rely heavily on X for awareness raising where we maintained a regular cadence of activity. Our total impressions on X during Season 2 vs Season 1 were flat while engagement (reposts, likes, replies) all decreased by ~10% while the rate of new follower adds increased by 20%. Our X presence was strongest when collaborating with ecosystem partners who amplified our messages. We continued our experiments on Warpcast and Debank.
- Analyst Relations. We sourced our first paid analyst report from Revelo Intel in support of the sINV launch.
- Affiliates. The GWG led the launch of an Affiliate program for large influencers.
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Trial & Retention:
- Usability. GWG conducted usability studies for FiRM to better understand UX and related adoption issues, helping to drive requirements for FiRM v2.
- FiRM collateral. GWG led efforts to onboard new collateral including COMP as well as adding cover from Nexus Mutual, while providing marketing support for all new collateral launches on FiRM.
- Content. GWG authored blog and X article content and also sourced a limited amount of paid content from community members. GWG led a rewrite of the DAO’s docs and published a weekly newsletter, The Recap, targeting heavy/loyal users of FiRM who prefer email-based content.
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Design & Community:
- GWG maintained active community moderation, though a community engagement campaign (sINV meme contest) faced interruptions due to product launch delays.
- We utilized freelance design talent in a limited number of circumstances including a well-received sINV launch video produced by the GWG. Visual assets are generally helpful in improving results on X and we continued to experiment with AI tools for this purpose.
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Capital Raising
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GWG explored avenues for treasury asset sales and capital raising to reduce DOLA bad debt, which we paused due to market conditions.
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GWG led discussions with outside counsel regarding creation of a legal entity.
GWG Season 3 180-day Objectives
Overview
The DAO’s “north star” objective of reducing bad DOLA debt – which remains essential to returning greater value to INV tokenholders – remains intact after a good Season 1 and Season 2 repayment performances. The GWG directly impacts three of the four success levers mentioned in our most recent long-term strategy post:
- Boosting Product Adoption
- Enhancing Product Profitability
- Securing External Capital
Directionally, this Season 3 proposal reflects an intensifying competitive environment for stablecoins and seeks to put us in a more aggressive marketing posture than in previous Seasons. But even with this bolder posture, it is possible to execute while minimizing impact on the DAO’s runway and bad debt repayment schedules via the use of DBR and Inverse Points. This proposal also attempts where practical to incorporate feedback received during Season 2 from contributors and community members.
Business Development & Strategic Growth Initiatives for Season 3
General Comments:
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In Season 3 the GWG recommends a more aggressive posture towards deploying DOLA Feds against well known lending markets like Morpho, likely in collaboration with third party vault curators like Re7 or Gauntlet.
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As part of our “sDOLA Everywhere” and “INV Everywhere” vision, GWG also recommends a more aggressive posture towards deploying sDOLA, DOLA, and sINV across emerging L2 and EMV-compatible chains. While the list of chains is expanding quickly, the opportunity cost of establishing a presence - as we did on Mode and Blast in Season 2 - on any given chain is low but the option value of acquiring the “next” veAERO NFT is high, in addition to revenue and DOLA circulation opportunities.
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The absence of acceptable DOLA price feeds for lending partners continues to be a challenge for the DAO. We previously funded a single Redstone oracle on Base for Gearbox (who delayed their launch on Base), however today we have opportunities on Ethereum mainnet, OP, and others. While this proposal increases the budget for Redstone feeds by one additional feed, as we pursue a vision of sDOLA and DOLA on many chains and as our DEX footprint expands, the DAO will need to accommodate the “fixed” costs of additional price feeds to support new lending partners.
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Strategic growth initiatives (SGI’s) represent partner-driven new product, distribution, or business model opportunities designed to catapult Inverse forward in our industry. SGI’s are ideally partner-driven and leverage partner ecosystems or installed bases, where the GWG provides leadership in drafting requirements documents, business model analysis, proposal development, or in the case of DAO treasuries, outbound business development.
Liquidity Partnerships
- Season 3 Objective: Close at least four new DEX partnerships on emerging L2s in collaboration with TWG.
- Focus: sDOLA, DOLA, and sINV on existing L2’s as well as candidate chains including: Berachain, Sonic, Solana, Ink, X Layer, Linea, Fraxtal
Lending, Perpetual Futures, Yield Aggregator Partnerships
- Season 3 Objective: Close partnerships across four third party lending platforms, one perpetual futures protocol, and two yield aggregators
- Focus: sDOLA, DOLA
- Season 3 budget request: additional 12,000 DOLA to fund Redstone DOLA feed on Ethereum mainnet.
CEX Listings:
- Season 3 Objective: Close one new CEX without listing fees, incentivizing with up to 10,000 DOLA bounties.
Strategic Growth Initiatives (SGIs):
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Season 3 SGI objectives: GWG will put forward a minimum of one strategic growth proposal during Season 3 including but not limited to the following:
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Inverse Federation “Sister Project.” A sister project can both accelerate bad debt repayment while being accretive to INV tokenholder value. There are multiple sister project concepts being driven in part by the GWG
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Inverse Points. As partners increasingly request incentives from Inverse in order to bootstrap new markets, pools, etc. and we make progress towards a sister project, a well-executed Inverse Points program can provide incentives that attract DOLA borrowers but also create fresh interest in INV itself at low cost to the DAO and without dilution of INV supply. This proposal was first made in Season 2 but a Season 3 objective would be to move to formal on-chain vote.
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New business model concepts. SGI’s may include formulating and analyzing longer-term business model concepts which may require longer incubation timelines. All have the “north star” of DOLA bad debt repayment as a priority.
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DAO Treasuries. Delayed during Season 2, diversification of DAO treasuries into sDOLA and DOLA LP positions on FiRM represents an excellent opportunity albeit with typically long sales cycles. The GWG has preliminarily identified a part-time resource to help penetrate this opportunity on a pay-per-performance basis which can be funded via existing DBR allocated to the Affiliate program on comparable terms.
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Season 3 budget request: fund pay-per-performance DAO treasury BD resource using existing Affiliate program DBR using identical terms.
The DAO has already approved a Redstone price feed for Base and for Season 2 the GWG requests additional funding for a Redstone feed on Ethereum.
Marketing Objectives for Season 3
Increasing Awareness
A sister project, USD2, represent the most likely major news event for the DAO in Season 3, though direct funding of marketing and BD initiatives for BD are not included in this proposal and will instead be proposed separately.
On a monthly basis, GWG recommends an increase in monthly spend for community/third party content creators who produce written and/or video content in support of our products. The DAO’s growing portfolio of products, chains, partners, and user profiles can be better served by experimenting with a larger array of voices that help us both raise awareness and induce trial. Compensation rates for content are subjective and can range from $50 for simple self-published review videos to $500 for insightful and visually engaging analytical content that we post directly as Inverse content or is posted by the author. Ad hoc “spiffs” for community members actively helping us to drive our presence on X with high quality short-form content also falls into this category.
- Season 3 budget request: 12,000 DOLA to fund regular community written and video content.
Community + Other
- GWG will continue to manage a part-time Discord moderator and also recommends additional low budget community contest(s) in support of new product launches like FiRM v2.
- The GWG also subscribes to a limited number of marketing and design tools.
- Season 3 budget request: 3,450 in DOLA for community and misc tools.
Capital Raising
- GWG will continue to lead/assist in raising capital in order to more quickly repay bad DOLA debt. Including:
- Asset Sales: Explore strategic sales of veNFT assets for DOLA bad debt repayment.
- External Funding: Resume investor talks for OTC raises as market conditions improve.
- Legal Entity: Continue discussions for establishing a legal entity for Inverse.
Budget Summary
GWG Contributors to be paid at the following rates:
| Name | FTE | Pro Rata Monthly Salary | Total For Season 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| patb | 1 | 14,500 | 87,000 |
Ad Hoc Expenses
The GWG multisig currently has 32,800 DOLA designated for a DOLA Redstone price feed and 307,440 DBR designated for the Affiliate Program. The GWG requests an additional 39,450 in ad hoc DOLA authorization.
| Expense Type - DOLA | Estimated Monthly Expense | Estimated 6-Month Total Expense | Available in GWG Multisig | S3 Budget Request (DOLA) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Business Development | Redstone Feed & Gas - Base | $1,300 | $32,800 | 0 | |
| Business Development | Redstone Feed & Gas - Ethereum | $2,000 | $12,000 | 12,000 | |
| Marketing | Third party written & video content | $2,000 | $12,000 | 12,000 | |
| Design | Freelance design & copywriting services | $2,000 | $12,000 | 12,000 | |
| Marketing | Tools & Subscriptions | $75 | $450 | 450 | |
| Community | Discord Moderation | $300 | $1,800 | 1,800 | |
| Community | Contests & Promotions | $200 | $1,200 | 1,200 | |
| Totals | 39,450 |
3,980 in unused DOLA from Season 2 is to be returned to the Treasury while 32,800 DOLA already approved for Redstone from Season 2 is carried over into Season 3.
Budget Request Summary
| Expense | DOLA |
|---|---|
| Salaries | 87,000 |
| Ad Hoc | 39,450 |
| Carryover | 32,800 |
| Total | 159,250 |