How Blockchain is Taking Over the Fan Engagement Scene with Fanzee CEO, Ajay Jojo

The fan engagement scene has been on an upward trajectory with billions of sports fans around the globe rooting for their favourite teams, athletes, and clubs. To this end, blockchain startup and innovation centre, Fanzee Labs launched its own decentralized fan engagement platform that uses blockchain technology to provide advanced gamification experiences for sports & entertainment.

The TON-based fan engagement platform helps sports clubs strengthen ties with fans and increase revenue via mediums such as quizzes, games, and puzzles. Additionally, the platform rewards fan loyalty, allowing them to earn passive income by supporting their favourite clubs and teams. The platform recently raised $2 million in capital funding to boost its sports fan ecosystem and help forge closer connections between clubs and fans.

Today, we are joined by Fanzee’s CEO Ajay Jojo, to discuss Fanzee, the community behind the project, the role of blockchain in fan engagement, and the overall crypto market stance in 2022.

Can you give us a brief background on Fanzee?

Yes of course! So Fanzee is a fan engagement platform created for the sports and entertainment industries. We exist between the intersection of the sports organizations, blockchain and fan engagement. The platform can be used by organizations who want to engage directly with their fans by using blockchain technologies through easy-to-use and immersive gamification mechanics.

We provide our partners with an all-encompassing digital fan engagement solution starting with the creation of their assets, their successful integration within their ecosystem and gathering actionable insights across the process all the while allowing the club to retain complete control over their digital assets.

How does Fanzee separate itself from other fan engagement platforms, both in the traditional and Web 3 space?

We consider the relationship between the club and its fans sacrosanct. That belief permeates into everything we build here at Fanzee. We do not migrate the club’s fans to a stand-alone platform that the club has no control over but rather embed ourselves within the existing digital ecosystem of the club. This ensures that what the fans experience are fan journeys created exclusively for them by the club based on the events taking place over the course of the season.

Additionally, our model of fan engagement is not attached to a particular class of digital assets, rather we incorporate different digital assets, all of which have their own use cases to create a deeper and more rewarding fan experience. We are extremely biased towards making this accessible to the average fan which unfortunately has not been the case with blockchain-based projects in sports thus far. The only prerequisite to partnering with us is having the intention to meaningfully engage with your audience and we do not have location and fan base size preferences for who we partner with.

Fanzee is planning to launch in the coming September, amidst a protracted bear market. Have there been any challenges to the development of Fanzee given the current situation in the crypto market? If yes, how have you been able to overcome these challenges to ensure a successful launch?

Price action does not determine the value of Fanzee and that is in part why we are extremely excited to be launching during such a time. Additionally, we are in the business of helping clubs engage with their fans. While there is no denying that being in a bear market is not ideal, it is not something we would categorize as a lever of success. At the cost of sounding corny, the passion for sports is recession-proof.

Our focus has always been to build a world-class product that provides real value to those using it. That has not changed one bit. In fact, this period gives us and the industry at large the space to focus on what the web3 movement was all about and that was to provide utility.

Fanzee is chosen to be the first mass-market retail project to feature on the TON Blockchain, a rather unique prospect. How did you decide to build on TON and how is it better than building on other blockchains?

Community is pivotal to the evolution of the TON blockchain and this is something we related to from the very start. By leveraging the power of community TON has managed to create an exceptionally powerful blockchain ecosystem and one that is best positioned to usher mass adoption through its integration with Telegram. We are immensely proud that we were chosen to be the first retail project to be launched on the TON blockchain. It is a testament to the work we are doing here at Fanzee.

As the NFT world grows on the TON blockchain, could an Ethereum disruption similar to what we are witnessing with Solana happen with TON NFTs?

We are still very much at the nascent stage of NFTs and other digital assets. It puts things into perspective if one was to look at its evolution through that lens. TON NFTs however offer a unique proposition through their integration with Telegram with a 700 million user base. If mass adoption is the holy grail, one can't deny that TON has one hand firmly on it.

Are there any partners (clubs, leagues, competitions, influencers) that Fanzee is currently collaborating/ in talks with?

We have around 10 partners who we are in the latter stages of onboarding as part of our public beta which includes football clubs, federations and esports organizations. Our pipeline consists of over 150 sports organizations that we are in talks with to launch in due course.

Billions of sports fans around the world wish to directly connect with their favourite teams, clubs, and athletes. Fanzee introduces blockchain, NFTs and tokens, as solutions to bridge this gap. Do you think the rise of platforms such as Fanzee and NFTs could be the gateway to mass crypto adoption?

What drives mass adoption is the value of a product. All the marketing efforts and wishful thinking can only get you so far with a product. The true test is if you can convey your value to your intended audience. We are proud of the fact that from day one we have approached building this platform with the singular objective of providing fans and clubs with experiences that speak to their passion as lovers of sports and the sense of community it fosters.

With the platform that we have built, we can most definitely showcase the value of blockchain technologies in delivering vastly superior experiences to a massive market. The recent bear cycle has in many ways helped push the needle towards a concentrated focus on utility. If we continue in that direction the user will respond positively and bring about a positive push toward mass adoption.

What should fans mostly be expectant of when Fanzee launches?

Fun, immersive fan journeys designed by clubs for their fans. It will be a fun and rewarding experience and we are sure that we will push up the adoption and perception of digital assets by providing discernable value across the chain.

Any closing words for the Fanzee community and potential customers?

We are incredibly excited for the launch so we could have you interact with the platform and help us continue to build truly transformational experiences.

CEO of Fanzee, Ajay Jojo is an MBA Candidate at Cambridge Judge Business School with past experience as a program manager for Just for Kicks, India and a director of strategy and operations at Midas Construction. Ajay is currently the CEO of Fanzee, leading the team to build the biggest fan engagement platform on the blockchain and doubles up as an MBA consultant for Roblox.