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0:00
Gianina Skarlett: I started just doing it myself. To be honest, the tech I had, marketing, I learned and just creating this by myself.
0:07
Once we did our initial mint or initial sale in February, we were able to
0:12
sell out, or all 8,888, and we raised over $2 million during this sale.
0:19
Natasha Miller: Welcome to Fascinating Entrepreneurs.
0:22
How do people end up becoming an entrepreneur?
0:25
How do they scale and grow their businesses? How do they plan for profit?
0:30
Are they in it for life? Are they building to exit?
0:33
These, and a myriad of other topics will be discussed to pull back the
0:37
veil on the wizardry of successful and fascinating entrepreneurs.
0:44
My book, relentless is now available everywhere books can be bought online,
0:49
including Amazon and BarnesandNoble.com.
0:52
Try your local indie bookstore too, and if they don't have it, they can order it.
0:56
Just ask them. The reviews are streaming in and I'm so thankful for the positive feedback
1:02
as well as hearing from people that my memoir has impacted them positively.
1:07
It is not enough to be resilient.
1:10
You have to be RELENTLESS. You can go to the RelentlessBook.com for more information.
1:16
Thank you so much. Gianina Skarlett is the founder, CEO, and lead engineer of W3 Learn Academy.
1:26
They have empowered 20,000 plus community members worldwide to take space.
1:32
In Web three, we talk about what Web three crypto and NFTs are, how she
1:37
made over $2 million on her first NFT release and how she's getting
1:42
the word out about her company. Now, let's get right into it.
1:48
Gianina Skarlett: Still W3 Learn Academy.
1:51
You could say We Learn Academy, so we like to say it, but it could
1:53
also be Web Three Learn Academy.
1:56
It's an academy that is focused on web three skills in helping people bridge
2:01
their web two skills through web three. So as we have been entering this new space of the Web three industry, there
2:08
are so many people looking to do the jump and we're here to create the content and
2:12
the paths needed for them to be able to come in and start building and creating.
2:17
Natasha Miller: And so for those that are listening that don't know
2:20
what Web three or Crypto or NFTs are, can you give a brief tutorial?
2:27
Gianina Skarlett: Yes. So for anyone here who's interested in Web three, web three, what I like to explain
2:31
to my friends, a simple explanation is the next iteration of the internet.
2:36
So in web two, we have the idea of, "Hey, we are creating content."
2:41
And we look at ads, we look at all these things, but we don't
2:43
really get to own any of it, right? We have a Twitter profile.
2:47
It doesn't mean we get to take it with us. With Web three, the new iteration, the difference is we are actually owners.
2:54
So we're able to own our data.
2:57
We're able to own even kind of our data to share with prospects.
3:01
If we would like'. So if you use something like Brave, you can choose to select what data to sell.
3:06
Where in Web two, when you use something like Google, your data just gets sold
3:10
automatically whether you like it or not.
3:13
So I would like to just say simple explanation.
3:15
Web three is the iteration where you get to own what you do on the internet.
3:20
Natasha Miller: I think a lot of people confuse or think that Web three is
3:24
the metaverse that is interactive, that is artificial intelligence
3:28
and AR talk to me about that.
3:31
Is that, so is that part of it or is that not what Web three is?
3:35
Gianina Skarlett: Yeah, so that's a great question. I used to work as a software engineer in a AI company, and I think AI is
3:42
kind of the web 2.5 in a way where AI is definitely going to be the future,
3:48
and it's going to continue to be used in web two and web three, but that is
3:52
not really what web three is about. Same thing with the metaverse.
3:56
If you think about it, we've all been participating in a metaverse.
4:00
That's the internet. We go on Twitter, we see people's photos, we interact, but the Metaverse itself,
4:06
what people talk about is this space that is being created by multiple companies.
4:11
They're trying to use this concept for us to kind of go back into,
4:16
I would say like a web two space. I know there were so many platforms suing this, where you go into a
4:21
website, you have your avatar, and you're able to connect with
4:24
people from all over the world. That is not what web three is about.
4:28
Web three is the technology underlying that.
4:31
Natasha Miller: Great. And let's talk then now next about cryptocurrency and just a little bit
4:37
of a overview for people that have heard the word but does don't have a,
4:41
not Aask wallet or D or not exchanging money in Coinbase or whatever yet.
4:46
Gianina Skarlett: Yeah, so for crypto, there are so many tokens out there, and
4:50
I'm pretty sure most of the audience have heard of Bitcoin, Ethereum.
4:55
Those are kind of the ones that you will hear about the most.
4:58
Probably the safest one, if we can even use the word safe in crypto.
5:02
But they're basically decentralized currencies that are not owned
5:07
by a central organization. So right now we have like, JP Morgan as a bank.
5:12
We have our money there. We know JP Morgan is the entire company that owns and is able to transact with
5:19
our money, with decentralized currencies.
5:22
It's, I'm trying to find like a very non-technical way of
5:25
explaining it, but basically there are notes all over the world.
5:28
That all work towards keeping this currency decentralized by not one
5:34
single point of person being able to own it, if that makes sense.
5:37
So if I own Ethereum, really I'm not the one person who owns it.
5:42
There are hundreds of computers that are validating every single transaction.
5:47
So there's not one person who can say, "Hey, I'm gonna give
5:49
Linda a million dollars." Just because all of these hundreds of computers will look at it and decide,
5:56
is this even a real transaction? So it just makes it safer to own money in a decentralized manner.
6:02
Natasha Miller: And banks like JP Morgan are actually getting
6:05
on the crypto bandwagon.
6:07
So what business does a centralized institution have in
6:12
decentralized money transactions.
6:15
Do they just flat to get their greedy fingers in the pie?
6:18
Gianina Skarlett: I mean, if we think about it, there are stocks, right?
6:21
Every company out there has stocks if they're public.
6:23
So meta has a stock. So if we look about cryptocurrencies is kind of having the same interaction where
6:29
you are buying a stock from this company.
6:32
Although it's a decentralized one, I know JP Morgan is
6:35
launching their own stable coin.
6:37
I don't think it's going to be as decentralized as other currency , but
6:41
I do like the fact that they are starting to participate in this
6:46
space which will bring in more eyes.
6:49
And for a lot of people, when you see this big player centering, it does
6:53
makes it more legit and more safe. Natasha Miller: But it also makes it less mysterious and exciting and underground.
7:00
Gianina Skarlett: Yes, it's definitely no longer I would hope, an underground thing.
7:04
I think this past year was a year where it really came into the mainstream, and
7:08
now we're seeing brands like Starbucks, Facebook, Gucci, Louis, Vuitton, like
7:13
all of them come into Web three, which I do think it's for the best, as we
7:18
are definitely looking for a massive. Natasha Miller: And then let's now talk about NFTs.
7:23
What are they in a nutshell? I own a couple.
7:26
I was going to do an NFT launch for my book launch and decided my audience
7:30
was not ready for it, and I was right. So from your lips to our listeners' ears, tell me about NFTs.
7:38
Gianina Skarlett: Yeah, so that's an exciting topic.
7:41
And I will say for all of my friends that I tried to onboard into the Web
7:46
Three Wagon NFTs, I just described them as digital collectibles, and
7:51
we actually saw Reddit do a huge onboarding their users into Web
7:56
three without even calling them NFTs.
7:58
They were just digital collectibles and digital avatars.
8:02
So simplest explanation, it's a digital collectible that resides in a blockchain.
8:08
So you could use Ethereum as the main token for it.
8:11
You could use a lot of different tokens.
8:13
So I'm just gonna stick to Ethereum. But it's basically a digital collectible.
8:17
It doesn't even have to be an image. It could be music, it could be video, it could be a poem,
8:22
it could be anything you like. It resides on the blockchain and it has a provenance.
8:27
Which points to the unique owner of it.
8:30
It's also unique, so they call it non fungible tokens
8:33
because each one, it's unique.
8:35
There will never be a replica of it. Natasha Miller: I love NFTs for, I mean, lots of different reasons I love tech,
8:42
but the one thing about an NFT that is exciting to me, and I'll give an example,
8:46
is if you buy this book from me for $20, right, and you buy it as an NFT, and then
8:53
you want to sell it to your neighbor.
8:55
Then as I understand it, as the original seller and the owner of this
9:00
book, I get a commission or I get a piece of the pie of when you sell it.
9:05
That's cool. Gianina Skarlett: Yeah. I think that has been one of the things that have brought so many creators
9:10
and artists into the space, and is that it's the concept of royalties.
9:15
Normally in art when you sell, something. You get that first paycheck and that's the last time you get money out of that sale.
9:21
With NFTs, you can ride into the contract.
9:24
Just to be really simple here and kind of technical, NFTs are basically
9:28
code, so in that code you can ride.
9:30
What is the percentage of perpetuity in royalties that you would like to get?
9:35
For us, a crypto tech onement is 6% and that is kind of like every cell
9:40
that happens, you are going to continue to get that royalty, which I think
9:44
for anyone who has been in the Web two world as a creator, it's a huge
9:48
bonus into coming into Web three. Natasha Miller: So let me ask you this clarifying question.
9:53
So, if we had an agreement that wasn't an NFT where I said, "Gianina, I'm
9:58
gonna sell you this book for $20, and you're like, thank you so much,
10:01
I will give you 6% of the book.
10:04
If I sell it to my neighbor." Then you sell it to your neighbor.
10:07
, but you don't tell me you sell it. I don't get the money.
10:10
I don't even know you've sold it. But if it were an N F T, am I getting an automatic notification
10:16
and an automatic deposit? Gianina Skarlett: Yes.
10:18
So with the NFT, since it's written into the contract,
10:22
you will get it automatically. You don't really have to do anything and whatever is your wallet or
10:27
your vault, which is the one that will receive the payment.
10:31
We'll just continue to get it without you having to do anything.
10:34
Natasha Miller: Yeah, I mean there's so many things about NFTs
10:37
I like, but I really like that. And so let's talk about this.
10:40
I know from my, I like tech and I'm tech forward, and it's pretty challenging to
10:47
sift through how many steps you have to take to get involved in crypto and NFTs.
10:54
Do you see that barrier? To entry, changing in shortening, or do you see us having to adapt to
11:01
learning how to choose a coin, how to invest in it, how to access it.
11:07
When you buy an NFT, it goes here and then it's here on meta mask.
11:11
Like it's easy to see some things on a browser, but sometimes it's
11:15
easier to see other things on your handheld device like it's maddening.
11:20
Where are we with ironing all that out?
11:23
Gianina Skarlett: Yes. That's an amazing question. I do think last year it was a hurdle, right?
11:29
Even for myself when I started learning about Web three, I can tell you so
11:34
many hours were invested to even understand how to even create one.
11:38
I do think now as so many organizations like ours, so focused on onboarding
11:43
movies into Web three, also in a very safely manner, I do see so much more.
11:49
Evolution in the tools that are being used in the UI experience.
11:54
I think that was one of the biggest things like UI.
11:57
UX was not there for anyone who was not technical, but I do see
12:01
a lot of big companies and small companies now focused on this now.
12:05
There are no code tools that are free for people if they want to
12:09
launch their own NFT collection. That wasn't there before.
12:12
Natasha Miller: Yeah. I mean, I think to reach a greater audience, they have to simplify it
12:17
and make it understandable, and as an audience we have to, there is some
12:22
work to be done, like, I don't know if it will ever be as easy as a click,
12:26
one click, or maybe it will one day, but it's far into the future, right?
12:31
Gianina Skarlett: Yes, I am very excited to win. It is one click.
12:34
I do see a lot of companies like Coinbase, they are developing a lot of
12:38
like really easy material for people to learn and always bringing rewards.
12:43
So if you do complete this course, you get some cryptocurrencies with us.
12:48
We're doing, "Hey, if you do complete a course, you're gonna
12:50
have an own chain credential." That says, "Hey, you passed this course."
12:54
So I think one, giving people rewards for actually committing to learn
12:59
something new, but also developing the tech to be simple to use.
13:03
So I did see for Reddit, when they did their whole NFT sale, which was digital
13:08
collectible, they could just buy it with a Stripe debit card, credit card.
13:12
That is what we should aim for, where people don't even need to
13:15
know that it's web three or crypto.
13:18
Natasha Miller: Right. Gianina Skarlett: It's just a normal experience.
13:20
Natasha Miller: Have you ever thought that you should write a book, that you should
13:24
write the story of your life to help other people learn from your experience?
13:29
Please go to memoirsherpa.com and learn how I can help you write, figure out your
13:35
publishing path and market your story, your memoir, to a best seller status.
13:42
How are you funding this new endeavor, this new company?
13:45
Are you bootstrapping? Do you have venture capital?
13:49
What's it like. Gianina Skarlett: Yes, so I did bootstrap it.
13:52
I started last year. Luckily as a software engineer I had my good savings.
13:57
So very thankful for that. I started just doing it myself.
14:01
To be honest, the tech I had, marketing, I learned and just creating this by myself.
14:07
Once we did our initial mint or initial cell in February, we were able to
14:12
sell out, or all 8,888, and we raised over $2 million during the sale.
14:18
Natasha Miller: Oh my goodness. Gianina Skarlett: Yes.
14:22
Natasha Miller: So how did you get the information out to those people
14:25
that bought that original mint? Gianina Skarlett: Yes.
14:27
And honestly that is, it goes back to normal web two marketing.
14:31
You create your profile on Twitter, you start talking about what in web
14:36
three, I say it's all about utility.
14:38
Like what is that user getting for supporting.
14:41
Natasha Miller: And what were they getting? Gianina Skarlett: So for us it was the biggest proponent
14:45
is our educational platform. All of our holders have access to it.
14:48
They don't have to pay any additional monthly fee for it.
14:52
We also do holders only, or members only events.
14:56
So in real life events, we're gonna have put in our Basel coming up, it's
14:59
all about creating that value that you think your audience will like.
15:03
So it's pretty much like creating a web two.
15:07
That will have that initial sale that will be really exciting
15:10
for them to participate in. Natasha Miller: So when did you start this company?
15:14
Gianina Skarlett: Yeah, so I started the company this year officially.
15:17
I started working on the concept in August.
15:21
So in August I- Natasha Miller: of last year? -started creating, yes.
15:24
Gianina Skarlett: So august, you started creating, you started it officially
15:27
this year, you minted two mil. How did you reach that big of an audience?
15:31
Natasha Miller: I mean, it can't be just from a Twitter profile, and I
15:34
know you're working with Sally, so talk to me about your marketing strategy.
15:38
Gianina Skarlett: Yeah, so it started back in August.
15:41
It was just creating a Twitter profile, and then back then I
15:45
didn't really have any other teammates, so it was just by myself.
15:48
I will say this, we started a discord immediately.
15:51
To this date, you don't need a discord.
15:54
There are other avenues you can use to communicate with your members, but
15:57
it was creating a Twitter profile, creating a discord, communicating our
16:01
value, which was, "Hey, I am a woman."
16:03
"I am in tech." "I want to bring more women in tech."
16:06
"I want to create a space for minorities."
16:09
And I want to create a space that feels kind of easy to understand
16:13
and that you feel like you belong. Because at that time it was a lot of bros in the crypto space, and
16:19
so I will say, that was something that worked in our favor, which was
16:23
creating this space that women and minorities felt really comfortable in.
16:27
Also, just creating that value proposition beyond from, yes, being an amazing
16:32
community, what else are you giving them?
16:35
And then the growth strategy was. One Tweets, tweeting, and I know for so many people, they're
16:40
like, who is even on Twitter? Web three's on Twitter.
16:43
So we would be tweeting three to five times a day collaborating.
16:47
So web three's all about collaboration, which in web two,
16:50
it's more about competition, right?
16:52
We don't see Facebook and Tumblr as an example, collaborating together.
16:58
But in web three, you do. So it was finding like-minded communities that we could collaborate and in return,
17:04
you're sharing your audience, right? So their audience becomes yours, and it was doing this weekly, every day, if
17:11
possible, finding ways to engage them.
17:13
So in this score, you have a direct communication with your
17:16
consumers or with your members. So being there present every day you're there communicating with them,
17:21
you're creating that tie with them that will really make them believe
17:26
in you and what you stand for. So it was doing that repeatedly, doing Twitter spaces, which are
17:31
basically like mini podcasts. There were weeks I would do six, six a week, and it was not only mine,
17:37
I would jump into other people's. So definitely just being precedent showing up.
17:42
Natasha Miller: And you're working with sally now on
17:45
mostly Google or Facebook ads.
17:47
Which one or both? Gianina Skarlett: None of those yet.
17:50
So Sally came in after our Mint.
17:52
She actually was one of the people that bought our, in our initial sale, and
17:56
then we met in LA and I heard all about her background and I'm like, I love her.
18:00
She needs to come in. She's been helping with our overall marketing strategy and honestly also some
18:06
strategy in terms of business development and who should we partner with.
18:11
Why? What event should we be in?
18:13
But we're still pretty much very heavy on Twitter.
18:16
So that's our main place we are expanding to LinkedIn, TikTok, Instagram.
18:21
But it's funny because in web three, if you run ads, it looks scammy.
18:27
So in web two ads are where it is, right?
18:30
Like I've seen so many business. Number one thing is ads in web three because of the whole essence of it.
18:37
It's so new. If you run ads for your company, it does look like, "hmm, maybe
18:41
they're scamming someone." Natasha Miller: And why does it look like that?
18:44
What is the trigger? Gianina Skarlett: The trigger is so many companies that came in, running
18:49
ads and then they would do rug, which means they basically took the
18:54
money after the sale and disappeared.
18:57
So it definitely burned a lot of people.
18:59
And I do know ads are the future and they're gonna stay, but it's
19:03
so early in web three that they're still not accepted with open hands.
19:08
Natasha Miller: What do you think about the potential of Elon Musk
19:11
laying off 70% of Twitter employees and the future of Twitter, which
19:16
has been really the mainstay of your top of the funnel for your business?
19:22
What are you gonna do? Gianina Skarlett: Yeah, so one of the things is because we are looking for
19:26
non-native audiences, we are expanding to non web three audiences, which are
19:32
on LinkedIn, like Instagram, TikTok.
19:35
But for the Elon question, yes, I think it's crazy.
19:38
He's going in and what I do think it's crazy is that they have 10,000 employees.
19:42
I do not know what is their strategy, what departments do they.
19:46
Natasha Miller: I have to tell you something right now. Today, my core business is Entire Productions, we're an event and
19:52
entertainment production company. We're producing an event at Twitter for Halloween.
19:57
I don't know what everyone does. Sales.
19:59
Who knows? Gianina Skarlett: You should snoop into departments and see what you find.
20:03
I think the core product will still be there.
20:05
And he actually came in strong by promising a creator's perk.
20:11
So now people are really hyped for this and really excited.
20:15
As a creator, you do want to make some revenue for creating, and I think that
20:20
has been something Twitter has not done. Natasha Miller: Right.
20:22
Gianina Skarlett: Where we see Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Snapchat will do it.
20:25
Yeah. I'm actually not really worried about the change of structure.
20:29
I do think that maybe it makes sense.
20:32
I guess it depends what departments, it's. Natasha Miller: So what is your team comprised of, right now?
20:39
Gianina Skarlett: Yeah, so we're still a very lean team, but is
20:42
marketing partnerships, business development, finance community.
20:47
So for web three, always have to be in contact with your members.
20:50
So we do have a community team, and then PR and product management
20:54
for W3 Learn Academy as well. Natasha Miller: So we talked about your marketing strategy.
20:58
Let's talk about your exit strategy.
21:00
Are you building this company with an exit in mind or an acquisition, or are you
21:06
gonna hold onto it for dear life forever.
21:09
Gianina Skarlett: That's a great question. I think for now, I do not have an exit in mind just because I'm
21:13
so passionate about the cause. I started engineering myself, coding through Code Academy when
21:19
I was 16, and then coming into tech and actually being a founding
21:24
software engineer at a tech company. I think I'm just so involved with the mission and.
21:29
When I see my mission, it's kind of selfish because it's kind
21:32
of like what I want and what I wanted to see when I was 16.
21:35
And so for now, no exit strategy.
21:37
I did hear that question a lot in my previous company was also
21:41
startup and people would always say, "Do you think we're gonna IPO?"
21:44
"Are we gonna sell?" But I know the founder were also just very strong believers in the company and
21:49
they're like, we're doing this forever. So, I kind of feel that way right now.
21:53
Are they supporting this past job of yours?
21:56
Are they supporting your new endeavor? Are you partnering
21:58
with them? Not as of now, just because our companies are still different, but they were
22:03
very supportive and honestly, when I started building this, I had a talk
22:07
with the co-founder cuz as you can imagine, if you're doing anything,
22:10
what a great mentor that would've been.
22:13
Yeah. You have to let them know. And I was thinking about it, it wasn't even solid.
22:18
And he encouraged me. He said, if this is something you're passionate about, go for it.
22:22
And he was really encouraging and even after pose myself becoming a
22:27
real founder, a lot of issues, right?
22:29
Or like a lot of things to think about, he was also very opening
22:33
to giving me advice and feedback.
22:35
So it was very encouraging to have that too.
22:38
Natasha Miller: For more inform. Go to the show notes where you're listening to this podcast.
22:48
Wanna know more about me, go to my website OfficialNatashaMiller.com.
22:54
Thank you so much for listening. I hope you loved the show.
22:58
If you did, please subscribe. Also, if you haven't done so yet, please leave a review where you're
23:04
listening to this podcast now. I'm Natasha Miller and you've been listening to FASCINATING ENTREPRENEURS.
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