After an unsuccessful ride in 2017, the non-fungible token, popular as NFTs, finally broke into mainstream adoption as celebrities, billionaires, corporations, and crypto fanatics rediscovered the utility and value of these cryptographically secure and unique digital assets. Despite the widespread adoption, the intricacies involved in creating, marketing, and selling NFTs are a barrier to most artists willing to enter the space.
As such, the explosive growth in NFT projects slowly faded in Q2 2021 before recent demand in these assets skyrocketed in mid-July. Promoting and collaborating with NFT artists in the space is one of the main reasons the NFT market had a resurgent start to Q3. Projects such as Envoy.art are at the forefront to help artists create NFT projects for their clients, from the ground up or in collaboration with selected partners, and generate revenue from sales and royalties.
With the NFT space growing in value and adoption rates, it’s only fitting artists can find an open marketplace to create, mint, and sell their art.
A fractured NFT marketplace
NFTs were created to ensure that artists could make some money and have control over their work. Despite the huge demand for NFT projects in the past few months, there are still lingering issues within the space, the main problem being the lack of support for artists and creatives in the space. As of today, there are just a handful of NFT artists in the space with the ecosystem having massive barriers of entry.
Additionally, NFTs also pose a problem to the newbies in the field given the complicated and complex channels to acquire one. Most NFTs are only available for purchase using cryptocurrencies, which further brings problems to users who simply want to use their fiat money in the purchase. If you are lucky enough to find a marketplace and some cryptocurrencies to purchase NFTs, then legal barriers in crypto could cause confusion on how to value the assets and report taxes on them.
Finally, the traditional art and entertainment industry remains detrimental to artists’ IP as most lose control of their art, face piracy, or pay high fees to streaming sites – losing the value of their art.
All these issues slow down the overall adoption of NFTs in the mainstream world, and it’s time to find the right solutions to support artists, collectors, and buyers.
A new revolutionary in the NFT space
Launched in early 2021, Envoy art has been focusing on the rising demand and potential of NFT projects with an interest in providing solutions to the above issues and provide solid control of art by the artists. The revolutionary team, led by Bram Verstraeten, CEO, found there are significant gaps in providing professional onboarding and servicing artists to create, market, and manage NFTs.
Following a $2.5 million private investment round, Envoy launched its first product in August 2021 with a goal to establish their own NFT label, ENVOY, producing innovative projects, creating a community, and catering to fans and collectors alike with a rich rewards system.
ENVOY creates NFT projects for their clients, from the ground up or in collaboration with selected partners, and generates revenue from sales and royalties. The company has a strong model with both B2B partners (artists who hire ENVOY to create/market NFTs) and consumers who discover and purchase NFTs.
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The platform focuses on community and cross-platform collaboration to offer its line of NFTs through cross-network channels and build a strong community around its social media platform. This will enable ENVOY artists, creators, and fans to meet on the platform, and buy, sell and exchange NFTs directly. The key part of this development is the provision of an on-ramp and off-ramp fiat channel for NFT buyers on the open market.
And what is an NFT project without celebrities? The innovative NFT platform enjoys the contribution of top EDM music stars including Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike.
Apart from enhancing the NFT space, ENVOY token holders will also enjoy other unique properties such as community incentives using their tokens, NFT authentication to artists wanting to secure rights to their art, and access to disruptive projects across the arts and entertainment world. Additionally, the platform will also have its own label and production studios to onboard upcoming artists.
The growth and future of NFTs
Over the past year, NFT marketplaces have generated over $3 billion in sales as the monetary value and interest in these digital assets skyrocketed at the start of the third quarter. According to Nonfungible.com, the total weekly amount spent on NFTs grew exponentially from about $2.3 million in January to nearly $231.6 million in less than eight months, representing a 10,000% growth rate during the year.
Notwithstanding, buyers of NFTs have clocked in at over 29,000 per week, a steep rise from 5,400 wallets in January. The most shocking stat, however, is the recent spike in primary sales of NFTs from $9 million a week at the end of July to nearly $40 million, according to OpenSea. This shows a sharp heel turn from reports that emerged in Q2 that NFT sales were slowing down.
Away from the numbers, billionaire interest in NFTs has also shot up as personalities such as Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, and Elon Musk, all tried their hand on the digital assets.
As the industry continues to gain adoption across the globe, skeptics still predict the ecosystem is a bubble and could pop at any time. However, with the unique and cryptographic features of NFTs, the future looks bright, especially for artists and creatives.
If the future of NFTs could be summed up in one phrase it will be “Artists life will be better!” NFTs create opportunities for new business models that didn’t exist before. Artists can attach their art, music, and videos to an NFT ensuring they will get royalties and proceeds every time the art is sold or resold. This incentivizes the artists and allows them to benefit from their creativity and art.