Meet Patron || The Platform that combines the power of social media and decentralisation to drive your business forward

Preamble

Brief History of Social Networking Service(SNS) and Influencers

Ever since social media became a buzzword, it has continued to gain more attention over the traditional media. And this all started in less than 2 decades ago with the intention of bringing people of different culture, colour or geography together inorder to communicate. Projects like hub culture and friendster were among the earliest set of networking sites to grace the landscape but they didnt quite make the grade over time until Facebook came and took the lanscape by storm; an app originally designed to serve a local community like the university. So how is it everywhere now? The truth lies in our natural inclination to do what we see others do directly or indirectly because the pull of many. Which is how influence came to be and now a decade after the introduction of facebook and other social media like twitter, the influencers business is growing big and the competition is getting harder day-by-day.

The internet has kept a lot of us busy but are we being productive with our time while getting some fun off it. For instance, a user crave for quality content, this means that someone who post quality content can be a source of relieve to any one who gets to see his post, interest is created. A consistent habit can help him gain some respect from his followers as well; and consequently interest leads to influence. Therefore social media has helped a lot of people to brew a new career of men called Influencers.

What does Patron represent

Patron is a hub where influencers and businesses meet to create a sharing economy for everyone. Influencer use their networking skills to share interesting products or markets with greater impacts to their niché or social media circle inorder to ensure they stay informed of the latest trend happening around them.

Before now, businesses only see an oppurtunity in using celebrities as a marketing tool for their product but as more ears became drawn to word of mouth, it has taken the flavor out of these type of deals which are always on the high-end. Therefore, entrepreneur have begin to sway to the fact that using someone who has the mold of an influencer for Ad purposes would be cheaper and makes more sense on the long run due to many reasons which will be outlined below.

• Creating a proper brand requires a long-term effort and the thought of paying celebrities exhorbitant fees can be disastrous for a company trying to grow

• Local influencers is a weigh-in option when a company is considering to build a proper brand because they are relatively cheaper and more available.

• A single mistake from a celebrity can have far-reaching consequences for an established, even less a brooding one. Just like earlier this year, kyle jenner simply tweeted about snapchat and the next hour, it was reported that snapchat lost close to $1 billion as a result of some loose statement. The power of influence!

Apart from this, the present influencers hubs are not robust enough to accomodate many qualified influencers within the space, which means they are led to lose their social skills which could have being useful to many small scale businesses who can barely sneeze. Could be true if we say social influence has changed the table so that those with little skill have the most power, while those with more skill have the less power on social media.

Patron has identified with the plight of the average influencer/business and seek to do things in the right way through the help of the blockchain. This takes us to our next topic

Why Blockchain-based??

Since satoshi first coined the word block chain in 2009, gradually people have come to believe that this is the new face of finance. But beyond, the technology holds a lot of advantage over conventional options. Some of it top attributes which makes it suitable for the sharing economy are outlined below

• Peer-to-Peer Interactions

Blockchain technology ensures that information can be exchanged in peer-to-peer fashion; which is very important for the sharing economy as it removes the need for middlemen and consequently reduce the extra cost associated with information sharing. This is achieved via the use of smart contracts to set contract terms and conditions

• Decentralised

Because there is no single point of control as with blockchain technology, there is little to no room for manipulation of the entire ecosystem which also improve the overall security as well. And with this arrangement, it will be impossible for another to claim the benefits of an influencer whose social media account is under attack.

• Immutability

Since every transactions on the blockchain is permanent, it ensures an influencer of bad reputation cannot buy favour from the system since he/she cannot delete his past record. Giving more room for influencers with high integrity to join the system. Same applies to sponsors or businesses patronising Patron. Integrity score is further corroborated via the ranking algorithm which is determined by

Number of Followers

The number of people are available through this user’s network

Engagement Level

The frequency of engagement between the influencer and their followers`

Reputation

Reviews of the influencers from their followers

• Smart Contract

All payment and Ad contract terms and conditions gets stated and executed automatically without any third party influence.

Identifying the Major Players within Patron Sharing Economy

Image credit

• Host or Influencers

They can set contracts with sponsors to generate a secure and stable means of revenue over a length of time agreed by both parties which could be scheduled based on per-click or on the spot basis, month or year-long and get paid once they promote the sponsor's material. Patron is more of an open source community for influencers who actively advertise themselves to sponsor based on a fair ranking score which determines the reputation of the influencer, depends on the criteria stated above.

• Sponsors

Also known as guest. They benefit from specialised followings and key demographics of their host(influencers). Which means that they are guaranteed to create a lead around their advertised brand or product for an agreed timespan by paying an influencer to run an Ad for the product-in-view. This arrangement can help companies to achieve direct sale easily.

• Fans

They are the most important in the cycle of sharing economy as they represent a potential buyers(yes or no), the product reviewers (negative or positive). They create a feedback mechanism for the advertised product for the company's use.

How it works

Image credit

Patron has some interesting package to ensure there is flexibilty between the sponsor and their host(influencer) and they come in 3 simple form.

On the Spot Campaign

Call it pay-per-click or pay-per-view, we are still saying the same thing. And the deal is simple, influencers only gets rewarded when a user clicks the Ad link of a product. This plan is designed to attract huge customers within a short-term and is suitable for product which are normally re-used almost everyday

Monthly Ad Campaign

This plan unlock some benefits such as undivided attention of the influencer for the time period. Influencers Ad commision is calculated based on a number of factors which are usually not based on the per-click alone. This plan is ideal for businesses who are looking to drive periodic sales high

Year-long Ad Campaign

This plan and can save a sponsor some money. It is the perfect choice for new businesses who wants to buildup their brandname. Influencers have the oppurtunity to play the dual role of a brand ambassador and a community manager.

Note : Payments gets settled via a smart contract

Patron Community-Sharing Culture

Patron seek to build a community where information can be shared conveniently without hold. That is why they are hosting a lot of community inspired projects so named

• Patron Academy

A learning hub for social media enthusiast and influencers. Accessible to any interested party for only a small fee denominated in the platform currency (PAT). Digital Certification are issued by Patron upon completion of the program to participants.

• Patron Live

This enables users to connect with their niche easily from one app. Therefore, fans can get quick updates and access to quality content once their favourite influencer do so. Patron Live also supports more than 10 active apps including Facebook Live, Youtube Live, Periscope Live(Twitter) amongst others.

Others are

• Patron Crowdfunding
• Patron Messenger

---

• See the Patron's DApp simply-built interface layout

Try their demo version here

---

PAT Token in the spotlight

PAT token will be used within the Patron economy as follows

By sponsors

• To engage with influencers and utilize their networks

By fans

• To promote the content of the influencers their follow through “likes” which in turn raise the influencer’s ratings and their marketability

By influencers

• To reward fans for contests, promotions, and events
  Source

Final Thoughts

Combining the concept of decentralization to sharing economy looks like a match-made in heaven kind of arrangement because both complement each other perfectly. Smart contracts, a key component of the decentralised economy makes the whole process more automatic and secure.

Use Cases

• A Typical Clothing Enclave

Fast N Fit is a new clothing line in manhattan that just rolled out a couple of days ago. But already they are feeling the strain of monopoly and manipulation by giants in the clothing industry as one of their outstanding recruit got hijacked by one of the heavy weights in the industry just a couple of days after rolling out their first major clothing line.

Their response was to launch a Ad campaign to release their new designs inorder to attract their competitors top customers as well. But there came their downfall as they couldnt secure top Ad agency or independent influencers on time;And time has passed by the time their competitors gained heavy leads on them as a result of the leaked design which the latest recruit revealed on his previous company.

Therefore, it seems that Fast N Fit will have a short exit until their media manager came to know of a decentralised Ad platform like Patron which can help them to connect their product with reputable influencers to give their new designs the needed publicity it deserves and be able to get new and interesting customer within and outside their jurisdiction. Inorder to quickly claim the market for their new design, they could use the one-spot campaign plan to gain huge lead within a short time and save their otherwise disastrous entrance into the market. Therefore they are able to avoid a major setback while they buy time to build a solid brand using other Ad plans. The right influencer can make all the difference.

ICO Information

Founder talks about Patron