‍Camilla McFarland isn't just a crypto OG who's been making moves onchain since 2013; she's also an advisor and member of Mojito's founding team, who's long been at the forefront of brand innovation in web3. 

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What better person to wax onchain poetic on the future of brands in web3 at one of the industry's largest global gatherings: EthCC? 

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Following her talk last year on Big Brands & Web3: NFTs and the consumer brand revolution, Camilla took the stage this week in Brussels to drop some more alpha on brands making moves onchain in a new talk, Zero-Party Cookies: the future of personalized consumer data. 

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If you fancy a quick refresher, we wholeheartedly believe that NFTs (and the web3 wallets that hold them and other self-owned digital assets) are the new cookies. 

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They're replacing obsolete practices around obtaining and leveraging consumer data — AdTech, CDP (customer data platforms), and CRM (customer relationship management) services — to offer brands dynamic and effective new solutions for not only engaging but understanding their customers. 

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By integrating web3 infrastructure and data flows, brands can augment their CRM and CDP approach and gain an entirely new toolkit for gathering, connecting, and owning consumer data in a new, future-proof way. 

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The future of consumer engagement is onchain via tokenized products, loyalty campaigns, virtual environments, and lots more. Get on board or get lost in the digital dust. 

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Ok, now back to Camilla’s talk, which got to the core of how web3 infrastructure — and blockchains like Ethereum, Solana, Optimism, and Base — are the bedrock of digital ownership. 

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Blockchains enable digital ownership everywhere, from decentralized digital finance (Bitcoin, stablecoins, memecoins) to a growing collection of real-world assets, where NFTs tokenize everything from art to alcohol and even your passport and home. 

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The ability to trade, fractionalize, swap, and pay for products using these assets has contributed to several web3-powered, decentralized markets (NFTFi, GameFi, DeFi, to name a few).

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Beyond the ability to own a product or digital currency is the level of ownership and transparency you gain over the data within digital assets and experiences — the lion’s share of which has been owned by centralized entities since the dawn of time (or at the very least the internet). 

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And why does consumer-owned data matter? Hint: it’s not just monetization. 

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While some might think only of the pixelated pastures of Decentraland or Sandbox when they hear the metaverse, this vast virtual landscape of products and experiences is actually all around us and an integral part of how we live, work, play, trade, chat, and create. 

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This goes far beyond avatars and web3 gaming worlds. 

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TikTok, Slack, Discord, Fortnite, WhatsApp, Instagram, iMessage, and Gmail — the metaverse right now can be boiled down to predominantly centralized applications where we engage with content we don’t own (or can’t take with us to other apps), experiences we can’t fully control, and our friends, family, colleagues, and everyone in between. 

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The metaverse of tomorrow enables you to bring your money and personal preferences into a live software layer built on top of all company data. 

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In this brave new decentralized world, brands can still sell and share the products and experiences that are their bread and butter—the difference is that they cut out the centralized intermediaries (Google, Meta, Hubspot, Amazon), which have for decades dictated how they can access and leverage consumer data to improve experiences and build stronger connections with their customers. 

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Since the “doing a drop” days of 2021-2022 (what Camilla calls the “throwing a house party” era) to the “connected data strategy” period of 2024 and beyond (“remodeling the kitchen”), smart brands are rethinking their mindset. If not, they should be — and Mojito can help. 

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It’s now not only about increasing drop revenue or selling out products but acquiring new customers (and retaining them), lowering CAC (customer acquisition cost), and increasing TLV (total locked value) of your campaign. 

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More brands than ever are realizing just how powerful web3 is for taking their tech stack to the next level — and building accordingly. 

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This shift is even more essential in a world where cookies are being phased out, AdTech is becoming more expensive and less effective, and global privacy laws are getting more strict on how companies can use customer data.  

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Fragmented third-party advertising tactics—namely, web tracking and ad targeting—are quickly becoming a thing of the past as the only way to engage customers. 

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What companies should prioritize are first-party tactics focused on improving the user experience: login info, site customization, and shopping carts. 

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In the blockchain-tech-abstracted future of web3, customers can engage with and purchase products in the same familiar way while fully owning the products they buy and the data they share with the brands who sell them. The process is also often more customizable, dynamic, and fun. 

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At Mojito, we can bring this to life for brands onchain via fully white-labeled, self-custodied (users manage their assets themselves) email-based wallets that abstract away crypto entirely—no confusing crypto password or transaction fees to scare away novice users. 

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And that’s only one way to onboard your community to web3 consumer loyalty — and keep them there. 

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Dynamic NFTs, token-gated experiences, NFC chips, allowlists, and discount codes — our invisible web3 experiences are built to go to market fast while increasing revenue and helping you foster a stronger sense amongst your people. You’ll also gain a new level of transparent data you can only find in web3.  

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Because in the web3-powered future of commerce, third-party data and all the fragmented, expensive, and shadowy processes that go into it will gradually disappear. 

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So, what will be left in its place? 

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As Camilla shared on stage, the future of cookies, advertising, and how brands reach people is going to be all about zero-party data, where we are the keys to unlocking data for ourselves on our own terms across a unified ecosystem of applications, assets, experiences, and technologies all linked together by a unified identity—ourselves. 

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For brands, the opportunity to evolve their products and processes to meet the changing needs of a new generation of engaged, enlightened users could not be greater. 

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Across this paradigm shift in brand marketing and consumer engagement, brands can:

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• Upgrade a limited (and expensive) targeting, retention, engagement, and data acquisition models. 
• New forms of monetization away from selling customer data.
• Feels less creepy: user control means opt-in.  
• Brands can be more intimate and authentic with consumers.
• Increase TLV, lower CAC.

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While users will enjoy and trust in: 

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• User-owned assets and customized intents. 
• Modular tools on top.
• Dynamic analytics for ourselves and brands.

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And products that are: 

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… customizable, authentic, privacy-focused, transparent, and created for different segments based on their needs, wants, and opportunities.

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Discover more about some of the brands we’ve worked with like Mercedes-Benz NXT, Etihad Airways, Sotheby’s, the Tampa Bay Rays, Pernod Ricard, the Toledo Museum of Art, and the Milwaukee Bucks (plus some others leading the charge in the image below) to see how this paradigm shift can come to life — then fill out this form to bring your brand into what’s next. 

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