Maker: Reinventing Finance

This Document

This document provides recommendations for creating future material that can most effectively impact each particular Maker audience.

Diverse Audiences

Maker creates copy across a diverse media landscape that at times conflates audience subsets with one another. While there are overarching traits of the Maker DAO brand, each audience is unique. The main opportunity in having a diverse audience base is to leverage each particular group with granular copy that makes them feel like you are talking specifically to them. We differentiate Maker audiences as DAI users, investors, developers and institutions. In each audience sub-set, it is important to be purposeful about amounts of Web3/traditional financial jargon being used.

• DAI users: copy for this audience should be broad and focus on the safety, security & ease of using DAI in traditional financial terms. Web3 jargon should be avoided unless it is abundantly clear that you are addressing a Web3 native sub-set of DAI users. The broadest and thus most valuable DAI audience wants to know how DAI can help to protect their resources and purchasing power throughout time.
  • Example DAI user copy: A stable currency protecting your wealth
• Investors: copy for this audience can stray from focusing on safety and security as investors generally have more technical knowledge and understand associated risks and rewards. Investors can be accessed with copy focusing on issues such as leverage, liquidity, credit and the various specificities of the extended Maker product line.
  • Example investor copy (Maker Vaults): Deposit crypto in our core credit-facility engine as collateral and generate Dai to send, spend or invest.
  • Example investor copy (D3M): D3M creates access to a wholesale credit line denominated in Dai.
• Web3 Institutions: copy for this audience can be as ideological and web3-centered as possible: “decentralized”, “open economy”, “transparent protocol”, “permissionless”, “borderless”… this is your place to get as deep as possible with your Web3 vibes.
  • Example Web3 copy: Maker is a decentralized, digitally autonomous organization at the heart of powering a new, borderless economy
• Non-Web3 Institutions (banks, legislators, compliance, etc.): copy for this audience should use terminology and concepts commonly understood in the traditional financial universe. Specific care should be taken here to properly present Web3 concepts in understandable TradFi terms.
  • Example non-Web3 copy (DSR): Dai Savings Rate (DSR) is a fixed interest deposit account where you can generate a risk-free return on your money.
• Developers: copy for this audience should be concise, focus on building solutions and technical aspects of products
  • Example Developer copy: start building on our tech stack

Guiding brand attributes

• We are transparent

  • Transparent is: open, honest, frank, straightforward, candid
  • Transparent is not: secretive, opaque, sneaky, evasive

• We are trustworthy

  • Trustworthy is: authentic, accurate, mature, responsible, ethical
  • Trustworthy is not: implausible, doubtful, misleading, unrealistic

• We are reliable

  • Reliable is: decent, predictable, safe, stable, decisive
  • Reliable is not: dishonest, unsure, undependable, weak

• We are secure

  • Secure is: protected, immune, insured, curated
  • Secure is not: insecure, unprotected, unsafe, disagreeable, endangered

• We are open and accessible

  • Accessible is: available, handy, reachable, usable, open, public
  • Accessible is not: inaccessible, limited, restricted

• We are live and vibrant

  • Live and vibrant is: active, dynamic, energetic, vivid, lively
  • Live and vibrant is not: dull, idle, inactive, quiet

  Copywriting Principles

  • The goal is to convey meaning to diverse audiences.
  • A healthy dose of empathy and a desire to educate are ideal.

  Further recommendations

  • Hire a lead in-house Copywriter
    • This document has dealt briefly with how to improve the copy Maker is producing about itself. However, it is unlikely that this document alone can ensure that copy being produced is consistent and effective without perpetual internal oversight. A lead in-house copywriter could ensure quality control of all copy contracted by Maker.
    • Being more consistent internally will help steer the overall narrative about Maker, however, an in-house lead copywriter could also create bridges to the external outlets creating media about Maker. We noticed in our research that what Maker is saying about itself and what external sources are saying about Maker do not always coincide. A percentage of discord between in-house and external is to be expected but work can be done to ensure a more accurate representation of the various aspects of Maker across the external media landscape.
    • The best copywriters can be conduits between the traditional financial universe and the burgeoning decentralized, Web3 financial sphere.
  • Introduce ChatGPT into your workflow when engaging with copywriters
    • Before sending your first draft copy to any copywriter run some prompts through ChatGPT in order to produce an alternative version. Send the copywriter both the version you have done alone and the one with the use of ChatGPT.

References:

https://miro.com/app/board/uXjVPG245F0=/

https://miro.com/app/board/uXjVP81IsfY=/