How to find the next golden opportunity? Look for those that can stir your emotions

Original Title: "How to Decide What Memecoins to Buy"

Author: OnlyApes

Compiled by: Deep Tide TechFlow

Welcome, friends!

Recently, the on-chain Meme market has been very active, which is part of the reason for the delay in publishing this article. I will try to publish future articles more quickly.

When you first start paying attention to Memecoins, you will be bombarded with an endless stream of coins. Thousands of new coins are launched every day, but only a few are worth your time and investment. Today, I will share my personal framework for selecting Memecoins. I have noticed that all those who are successful in trading Memecoins have similar philosophies, but differ due to their personal life experiences.

A key aspect of choosing Memecoins is understanding which ones you should buy; this process is personalized and authentic. Of course, there are some universal, widely recognized winners. However, in certain cases, with your unique perspective, you may discover some coins that others have not fully understood.

You can think of each Memecoin as targeting a specific market. Every good coin should resonate with a particular group. These groups have unique values, beliefs, cultures, and emotional responses to events. The deeper your understanding of a coin's target market and its ability to gain recognition within that group, the more likely you are to find a successful coin.

This is why simple concepts like "cute puppies" can garner such massive attention. Almost everyone can resonate with cute puppies. This is also why tokenizing existing Memes can have a powerful effect. However, it is currently very difficult to know which cute puppy to buy.

There are just too many coins and cute puppies.

I would simplify the process of choosing puppies and kittens to: only buy those coins that have already succeeded. You are unlikely to encounter a new Dogecoin or Catcoin that reaches a market cap in the billions.

If you are determined to look for Dogecoins, I suggest focusing on some special cases, such as the owner of Doge adopting a new dog named Neiro. Only focus on those new animal coins that are already famous or that leverage the fame of other well-known coins. However, this part of the market has become so "PvP" that I personally choose to ignore all newly launched famous animal Memes. If you must participate, either buy all the coins that are currently PvP, or wait until the winners are chosen and then participate, realizing that your coins may face the risk of "vampire attacks." Personally, I can completely avoid boundless gambling, so I usually choose not to participate.

I have a key belief: you do not need to make money on any specific Meme. Aside from getting some likes online, buying a coin that everyone talks about for a few days is completely irrelevant. You just want to collect those coins in your Meme portfolio that significantly outperform mainstream coins (BTC, ETH, SOL) and maintain your gains.

The focus today is to provide a framework for selecting Memecoins. This also means being good at ignoring Memecoins, especially in the early stages when you should be collecting data points.

Why Do People Buy Memecoins?

This is a profound question, and everyone has their own answers. Some people buy them because they might gain huge financial returns, while others find them entertaining.

In the context of Crypto Twitter, people primarily buy Memecoins because they believe others will buy them.

Current mainstream trends include:

1. Ordinary crypto investors buying coins they believe non-ordinary crypto investors will buy at some point in the future (mass market).
2. Ordinary crypto investors buying coins they find interesting (crypto market).

Coins in both the mass market and crypto market can perform well. Until a real bull market emerges and there are a large number of ordinary participants, you need to focus on those coins that at least perform well in the crypto market.

Framework

If you want to make quick money in the Memecoin space, you need to pay attention to the speed of attention flow. In other words, when you are making short to medium-term investments, the main goal is to look for potential viral spread.

"But who can know what will go viral!"

Any qualified content creator will tell you that this is simply not true. Anyone with a certain fan base has at least experienced a few viral moments.

Remember I mentioned that everyone has unique experiences to guide their choice of Memecoins? For me, this is about understanding how people react when creating written content.

Memecoins are essentially a form of content you can speculate on.

When I create content for crypto protocols, I aim to enhance my copywriting skills. I stumbled upon a very useful framework created by YouTube/Twitter content creator Shaan Puri.

When I sat down to analyze my Memecoin framework, I realized that many principles of viral content were applied in the selection of Memecoins, and it actually works.

Like viral content, every excellent Memecoin can evoke emotional resonance.

I adjusted this framework to make it more suitable for Memecoins.

You need to focus on those Memecoins that can evoke the following emotions:

Cute --- "Wow"

This is typically your standard dog, cat, hippo coins. By the way: I think Moo Deng is ugly and not cute at all. However, regular people like it, so let it rise to a billion dollars.

Funny --- "Haha"

Everyone has a unique sense of humor, but ideally, you want something that makes you laugh to also make many others laugh. If your sense of humor is not understood by anyone, you might be out of luck.

Shock and Awe --- "Incredible!"

Stunts like little people fighting, someone self-immolating, or anything that can evoke a sense of wonder.

Absurd --- "What the heck?"

Similar to shock and awe, but more focused on stupidity. "Brain-dead" coins like Skibidi Toilet fall into this category.

Anger --- "That's so offensive / No way"

Anything controversial. Racist Memecoins fit in here. (Note: Actual buyers are not the ones who feel angry about the concept of the coin. The real target is to make others feel angry, thus sparking discussion and attracting attention.)

Disgust --- "That's so gross"

I don't have good examples of Memecoins for this, but I mention it because it applies to content. I think this is the weakest emotional trigger for me because I don't want to repeatedly see things I find disgusting in my Meme collection.

We live in a world of endless content.

You need emotional triggers to capture people's attention.

Memecoins are just tokenized attention.

Note: Emotional triggers are not the only reason for the success of Memecoins. A better way to understand the framework is that when emotional triggers are present, the chances of success are higher. There are many other factors at play in the Memecoin space (such as holder base, distribution, mainstream meta). Emotional triggers help Memes get noticed.

Typically, coins that extend from existing brands, followers, or recognizable movements can bypass the need for emotional triggers. Because people have already established an emotional connection, attention follows. This is a key driver of the argument I published in March about ZYN. When you add emotional triggers to these types of Memecoins, they have the potential to truly explode.

When you combine multiple emotional triggers, the results can be quite crazy. Racist joke Memecoins perform well for this reason. They evoke anger and disgust among those who dislike these coins, while others find them funny. This creates an emotional collision that attracts attention. Think of coins like Retardio, George Droyd, Indian Call Centre (rest in peace). (Let's temporarily set aside the moral discussion of racist Memecoins in this article—I'm just explaining why they rise and the reasons behind it.)

Mark Cuban's parody coin CHABENISKY is a great example of something that is both absurd and funny. It also leverages his celebrity effect to attract more attention. Some people are drawn to it because it's funny, others because it's strange/absurd, and some may feel anger towards Mark.

Don't assume that your reason for buying a coin is the same as someone else's. Ultimately, the value of your coin depends on the value of the holder network. A coin needs to be able to reach the target buyer network and evoke emotions from them.

In summary, in the world of Memecoins, emotional intelligence (EQ) is far more important than intelligence quotient (IQ).

Management Tips

Memecoins have proven to be a permanent component of cryptocurrency. This means that taking the time to master the creation and trading of Memecoins is worthwhile. They are the most accessible opportunity for anyone to create a project that could reach millions.

Many people ask me what bots and tools I use on Solana, so this might be worth writing a separate article. You might not believe it, but I spend most of my time using the Jupiter frontend and Phantom wallet. A few weeks ago, Jupiter released its own trading terminal, and I tested it, resulting in a significant improvement in my execution efficiency. Over the past few months, I may have lost tens of thousands of dollars trading with basic tools.

It's not perfect (setting slippage too high can be troublesome when executing trades during high volatility), but it's definitely better than what I was using before. If you think there are better trading bots, please let me know, and I will give them a try. Jupiter's fee is 0.50% per trade, which is sufficient for me. I prefer to keep things simple and focus on my Meme selections rather than the complexities of various tools.

Important note: I have not conducted any research on the security of this trading terminal. You should not put your entire portfolio into Memecoins. If you really do, please do not send all your funds to any trading bot. This is just to handle smaller investments through actively managed strategies. As I mentioned in the previous article, the Memecoin space is more about tracking trends and finding coins that can be added to your Meme portfolio. Due to asymmetry, you do not need to take on too much risk in terms of portfolio size.