Niftmint - Brand Direct NFTs

#1

Niftmint - NFTs for Brands on their channels

Funding Tier:

Tier 2 - $50,000

Project Overview:

Niftmint is an enterprise retail-focused company allowing Brands to build loyalty and awareness, while selling new digital products directly on their website, without the need to manage or introduce cryptocurrency to the customers. Niftmint is the first NFT minting, listing, selling, and custody platform for Brands installed directly into their sales channels.

Brands don’t want to be sending their customers to Amazon or Ebay to buy their products, and so why are they sending their customers to third party marketplaces for NFTs? Furthermore, Brands don’t want their product listed directly next to other company’s products, and so why should they? With Niftmint, brands will be able to:

  • Mint on demand or mint NFTs from your channels at the time of customer’s purchase

  • List NFTs to their sales inventory, and introduce at checkout as ‘one-more-sale’ opportunities

  • Sell NFTs to their customers in their active checkout cart, using the payment method they were already going to use (credit card, PayPal, etc).

  • Custody the NFTs for brands, displaying the NFTs directly back to the customer, and only moving the NFTs out-of-network when the more advanced/savvy consumers wish to move their NFTs to their own personal wallets.

Niftmint is looking to partner with Conflux to support the NFT minting process for Niftmint. Niftmint will work as the Layer 2 application, facilitating the exchange between the Brand and the blockchain. Niftmint has had several conversations with $10bn+ revenue fashion and beauty companies looking to install the Niftmint NFT flow directly into their checkout process - with special emphasis on deployment of NFT capabilities into APAC nations. With support, Conflux can become the preferred partner for the deployment of Niftmint into direct Brand sales channels, as well as be the gateway into NFT sales and ownership for APAC-based sales for major retail brands.

Project Details

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On the brand and end-user side of Niftmint, while the consumer is going through the standard checkout flow on the Brand’s website, the NFT purchase is sent via API to Niftmint’s database. This will include the customer ID and the purchase data.

From here, an API triggers into the product specific smart contract to mint the NFT. The NFT is placed in a custodial wallet for the brand, and the customer database will be updated to reflect the NFT attribution to the customer ID.

As the NFT is attributed to the customer ID, an API displays NFT and customer ID back to the brand, and the brand displays this NFT back to the customer (in the user’s profile, account, et cetera).

If at any point the customer wants to move their NFT out of the custodial wallet and into their own personal wallet, they will provide their personal wallet address and Niftmint will transfer the NFT to the consumer.

Numerous designs for the user interface on both the brand and consumer side can be seen at www.niftmint.com

The API facilitating the display of the NFT back to the brand’s website is a Flask application that interfaces with the NFT smart contract, formatting the output and returning the output. The web service is hosted on Heroku.

Niftmint wants to integrate into Conflux to allow enterprise scale retail companies to mint NFTs on the Conflux blockchain.

Leadership

Jonathan G. Blanco - Founder, Technology, Commerce
Past: Retail Tech & Commerce exec @ Startups and Enterprise scale, 5+ years relevant blockchain experience
LinkedIn Email

Mike Morgan - Partnerships, Operations, Database Infrastructure
Past: Management consultant & startup ops, 4+ years relevant blockchain experience (US/Can/Ch/HK/SG)
LinkedIn Email

Rui Maximo - Blockchain Developer, Cybersecurity, Lead Programmer
Past: Smart Contract Auditor @ largest US Bank, ERC-20,721,1155 Smart Contract Development (5+ years), 20 years cybersecurity engineer
LinkedIn Git Email

Niftmint, Inc.
A Delaware Cororation, Headquartered in Seattle, Washington
Git

Milestones

Total Allocation: $50,000
Total Duration: 2.5 Months

Milestone 1 | Test Net
$20,000
Writing and deploying smart contracts on test-net to support 10K+ NFTs
During this period we will write the smart contract and architect to be able to create high volume batches of NFTs to support customer needs of high volume sales and attributing to customer ID
Timeline: 30 Days

Milestone 2 | Main Net
$10,000
Writing and deploying smart contracts on main-net to support 10K+ NFTs, plus the ability to add new NFT or repurpose smart contract for new high volume NFT contracts
Timeline: 14 Days

Milestone 3 | API smart contract deployment via eCommerce integration
$20,000
Our customers sell products on their websites. With this last milestone when a customer of the brand purchases an NFT on the eCommerce website we will create the NFT at that moment via API and attribute to the customer.
Timeline: 30 Days

Engagement, Vision, and Other

At Niftmint, we take a brand-first approach to NFT sales and integration. As such, we are in numerous conversations with household name media companies, multibillion dollar global retail companies, event hosting giants, and numerous other entities. We strive to provide a seamless engagement for both brand and consumers in purchasing, viewing, and custody of NFTs, and want to build into Conflux to facilitate this.

As the only NFT company focused on integrating into Brand’s active channels (as opposed to sending NFT considerations out to third party marketplaces), we have a significant inbound channel of Brands looking to integrate our solution.

Niftmint envisions itself as a mixture of Paypal, Stripe, and Coinbase. Niftmint will be the NFT purchasing portal for retail consumers, allowing for NFT purchase and the same way as any product they buy online. Niftmint will also be the custodian of NFTs, allowing consumers to see their NFTs in their Brand’s websites and accounts. As consumers don’t worry about shipping logistics, supply chains, financial institutions and merchant processors as they purchase products online from their favorite brands, consumers won’t worry about wallets, blockchains, crypto, or security as they purchase and own NFTs from their favorite brands.

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5 Likes
#2

I love the idea of the integration with e-commerce and how an individual can buy an NFT along with real goods and that NFT is custodied by the app until the user requests transfer to their own account. I think this would both reduce barriers NFT ownership while retaining their ability to later take full ownership with a conflux wallet.

It’s my belief this app, as stated, would be a useful tool for driving buy-in to the Conflux network by global brands as well as new users.

Question: Any plans to utilize the fiat-to-nft framework developed by the Conflux team?

5 Likes
#3

Wow GLM, what a great articulation of what we’re doing! Glad that you’re on board. With a Conflux integration and partnership, I know we can push a significant number of users to the Conflux chain (both individuals who are active in the crypto space, and just average retail consumers).

Regarding the fiat-to-NFT framework, I think thats absolutely in play on our translation end. There’s a decent amount of consideration we have about whether we hold a CFX treasury or utilize the fiat-to-NFT framework for moment-of-sale minting. I think that’ll be explored in partnership once we have the direct chain and API integrations completed.

Thank you again for your support, and for the awesome summarization!

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#4

Jonathan here, CEO of Niftmint. I wanted to share we were recently quoted in a CryptoSlate article about China and Web3.

“Breaking into the Chinese market for Brands is an incredibly difficult task with their physical products and services, but NFTs and Web3 dramatically reduces this friction. With 15 percent of China being GenZ, more than 210 million people, the opportunities for digital goods in a mobile-first environment are unlike any other. In 2022 you will see massive brands entering China with NFTs and Web3, and these brands will gain an advantage with their physical products as well.”

We see Conflux as a major partner for Niftmint to bring US brands to China via NFTs.

You can read the full article here:
https://forum.conflux.fun/t/niftmint-brand-direct-nfts/12708

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#5

Hi Niftmint team, thank you for applying for a Conflux Network grant! This is a promising use case for NFTs and I’m excited to see that you will build this product on Conflux.

So do you focus on the global market or China only? I’m asking because the Chinese market has special requirements like translation, WeChat miniapp interface, WeChat Pay / AliPay integration, etc.

What is the current status of your project? Do you have a PoC implementation of the NFT minting and listing logic or the 3rd-party integrations?

Could you provide some more details about your tech stack, specifically the blockchain part? Which token standards are you going to use? Will you add any custom extensions to your smart contracts? Where will the assets (images) be hosted (IPFS / your servers / brand’s servers). If users can trade on your site, is trading orchestrated by your servers or by a smart contract?

Providing custodial wallets is essential for good user experience. How will you make sure user assets as secure, even in the case of potential cyberattacks?

Should we expect the first brands offering NFTs right after mainnet launch? Could you add more info about your marketing plan (with KPIs) to your milestones?

Will you support crypto payments?

Can users resell their tokens on your platform, or they can only buy and withdraw to their own wallet? I think a cool NFT use case for brands is the “buy-then-redeem” model, where I first buy a token that represents a limited-edition physical item, then trade it (potentially earning profit), then at any point the current owner can burn the token and actually redeem the physical item. Is this something you’re planning to support?

Overall, I’m in favor of this application. Please add more details to your milestones, in terms of technical and marketing deliverables. With your current high-level description the price seems high, given that standard ERC721/ERC1155 tokens are quite simple to implement and it’s unclear what kind of technical infrastructure you’ll need to “support 10K+ NFTs”.

3 Likes
#6

Cool project!

Would love to hear more on your go-to-market strategies for the platform, and how you plan on reaching both sellers and buyers.

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#7

Hey @Christian great question. Our team has a great amount of experience with acquiring brands and customer acquisition. I have been working with Brands and building eCommerce integrations since 2014 and originally got involved in commerce in 2009 when I opened a physical retail store. I started a Blockchain Conference by accident called the TF Blockchain Conference and we have had 4 sold out conferences to date along with podcast, webinars, and virtual events.

I say all that because we will be implementing many of these strategies for Niftmint. We have been attending and speaking at eCommerce conferences and been the lone NFT company in attendance. We are currently talking with one of the largest eComm conferences in the US about providing NFTs for their attendees as they are our exact target market. We are also putting together an NFTs for Brands Conference which will be targetted toward corporate executives at retail brands. https://www.tflabs.io/nfts-for-brands-con

In addition to the events we have done cold outreach via LinkedIn and email and have been able to start conversations with C-Level and VPs at top retail and CPG brands. We also have received a great amount of inbound leads through our Blog post and landing pages regarding NFTs for Brands.

Regarding the buy side, as we support Brands in selling NFTs directly on their eComm channels, they provide the customer through their communities and direct selling channels. We simply facilitate the minting, selling, and custody so they can keep their customer happy, engaged, and lead to a quick transaction.

Let me know if you have any other questions.

Best,
Jonathan
CEO & Founder @ Niftmint

1 Like
#8

Wow, @thegaram, awesome questions! These are all great and important questions to what we’re trying to do - I love it. Let me run down the questions and answers below:

So do you focus on the global market or China only? I’m asking because the Chinese market has special requirements like translation, WeChat miniapp interface, WeChat Pay / AliPay integration, etc.

Great question. We’re focused on the global market, definitely US brand first (as we’re based out of the US and thats our expertise). The China bit is interesting because we have a major US based fashion and makeup company thats looking to launch the NFT program for their retail base in China. As that partnership would go, Niftmint is supplying all the infrastructure and the purchase/mint/custody/transfer process, and this company would be responsible for their end user UX. You’re definitely right about the special requirements, back in 2018 I spent a little over a month living and working in China working to enable ‘by now’ features in social commerce apps with crypto. Thankfully, we don’t have to have any translation, WeChat/AliPay integration, etc. considerations at this time.

What is the current status of your project? Do you have a PoC implementation of the NFT minting and listing logic or the 3rd-party integrations?

We’re in the process of building it out, we just finalized a contract for the world’s largest retail conference to be their NFT solution and deploy Niftmint into their ecosystem. A major reason that there is no PoC is because we’re running a sales-led product strategy and API driven, building the product to fit the users (enterprise scale brands) rather than trying to get the users to it the product.

Could you provide some more details about your tech stack, specifically the blockchain part? Which token standards are you going to use? Will you add any custom extensions to your smart contracts? Where will the assets (images) be hosted (IPFS / your servers / brand’s servers). If users can trade on your site, is trading orchestrated by your servers or by a smart contract?

We’re excited about CRC 721 and compatibility with EVM. With regards to custom extensions to smart contracts, i’m not entirely sure what you mean by that? The assets will definitely be hosted, each brand might have their own internal requirements for the image hosting, so I can envision some brands will be ok with having it on IPFS, others may want it on AWS or Google Cloud. The hosting and token standard will definitely be use-case specific, and we’re building in such a way that we can facilitate all of each brand’s unique needs.

Providing custodial wallets is essential for good user experience. How will you make sure user assets as secure, even in the case of potential cyberattacks?

It’s great to reduce friction and make retail consumer’s foray into NFTs and digital assets a seamless integration. I’m with you, can’t stress security enough. We’ve been working (in a friendly relationship) with a group that launched their NFTs over the weekend, solid project, but the amount of B.S. that came their way from a multitude of fronts was incredible. Good thing the person heading up our smart contract development has been working 20+ years as a cybersecurity engineer :slight_smile:

Should we expect the first brands offering NFTs right after mainnet launch? Could you add more info about your marketing plan (with KPIs) to your milestones?

After mainnet launch, we will conduct final internal tests surrounding the integration of the user facing API into the Conflux protocol, and once that is completed, turn it live and begin to allow brands to sell their NFTs direct to retail consumers. With a current contracts in hand, let alone the push for integration with the major retailer i’ve mentioned above, the 10K+ NFTs we’ll need to start pushing out is looking to be a ~2 month timeframe. As the only NFT company that’s working to enable NFT purchases and all the above processes directly onto the brand’s existing website and UX (not making people click out to 3rd party websites), the amount of inbound we have is staggering. Brands want this solution, and brands want to push their users to purchase these NFTs (think $5 NFTs, not $500,000 NFTs) because its a net new complimentary product that doesn’t cannibalize their existing products.

Will you support crypto payments?

Depends on if the Brands do! We integrate directly into their sales flow, so if the brands are accepting crypto at the point-of-sale, then yep!

Can users resell their tokens on your platform, or they can only buy and withdraw to their own wallet?

Here, I think you’re thinking of Niftmint as a platform, which we are not. We’re an integration directly into Brands existing websites, the same way you don’t go to Stripe.com to pay for your purchase on Nike.com. You check out on Nike, with a payment process powered by Stripe. We have no plans for resale at this point - BUT - the “buy then redeem” idea is a great idea for down the roadmap. As it stands, the actions users are able to do with Niftmint are buy NFTs in. the brand’s checkout flow, view their NFTs in the brand’s website (on their user account, however each brand has their individual user accounts set up), and then withdraw if they want.

Regarding the funding, the development onto testnet will definitely be expensive, and we’re trying to reach alignment with Conflux that we can have the funding and support on the Conflux side that we can prioritize the integration into Conflux and prioritize the pushing the enterprise retail company live on Niftmint/Conflux. Once we have testnet life, there will be more finessing and dialing in the smaller nobs for launching on mainnet (which is why it’s only half as much), and then the final steps of ‘integration hell’ between the brand facing api, smart contract api, and smart contract itself which allows the turnkey eCommerce integration for brands will be expensive as well.

I really appreciated reading all your questions, and responding in turn. I hope I could have been helpful in illuminating more aspects of this project! If anything above doesn’t make sense, or you have more questions, please feel free to keep them coming, it keeps us fresh :slight_smile:

2 Likes
#9

Hi @mikemorgan, regarding this response. Does this mean, the user will not be able to view the NFT in their crypto wallet? Only on the brands website? I wanted to clarify that part.

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#10

Hi @Conflux_Cami, thanks for the clarifying question! Think of it like Coinbase, when you buy anything on Coinbase, it doesn’t pop up in a wallet that you own, its just displayed back to you on the Coinbase UI. If you want that crypto in your own wallet, you transfer it from Coinbase to your wallet.

Exact same flow for Niftmint and NFTs. Users can view the NFTs in their own crypto wallets if they want to move the NFT out of the Nifmtint custodial wallets. The reason we’re taking this approach, is for the broader retail consumer market, most customers won’t go through the sometimes complex process of setting up everything they need. It’s the most frictionless approach - same reason Coinbase does it.

Let me know if that answers your question! I can give case examples of this flow if you need.

Thanks!

3 Likes
#11

Thank you for answering that. I understand now.

Your project is great. I got to meet Jonathan at NFT.NYC, looking forward to working with you guys. :crossed_fingers:

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#13

Yes! @Conflux_Cami I totally remember meeting you at NFT-NYC. Then we saw @SmoothCB and tied it all together. Chris actually spoke at my conference in Seattle years ago.

I think there are some great opportunities for Niftmtin and Conflux together. T

2 Likes
#14

Hi Mike, thank you for your quick and detailed response.

I suggest you make sure your application covers all points in the template so that the committee can vote about it during our next meeting.

I’d be glad to see more details on these two points:

  • “High-level technical approach, product flow & architecture (along with a diagram).”
  • “Overview of the technology stack being used, including API specifications, and documentation of core components.”

What’s more important, please add more details to your deliverables:

  • “Specification of the software or deliverable (will be used to confirm milestones have been reached).”
  • “ATTENTION: Be sure to include community growth and traction KPIs into your milestones wherever possible.”

Milestones should have clear deliverables that we can easily verify after the work has been completed. This should include both technical and non-technical (marketing/community) items. You can refer to some previous applications for examples [0] [1].

2 Likes
#15

Hi @thegaram! Apologies in the delay in getting back to you, but I hope you and all of the Conflux team had a great holiday season and a strong beginning to the New Year. Regarding your questions, i’ve added answers down below to the questions. Please let me know if you need me to insert any of these into the overall application itself.

High Level Technical Approach, Product Flow & Architecture / Overview of the Technology Stack:
I’d like to stay as high level here as possible, we don’t want to be putting out so much information as to allow for rapid reverse engineering - at the moment of purchase on a brand’s website (read: regular cart checkout process), a trigger is sent, adding the customer’s unique Customer ID (the one that the brand already uses), as well as the NFT purchase information, into a MongoDB. This customer ID is then added to a NFT minting queue, which will take place on an hourly/daily/weekly minting schedule as per the needs/volume for each brand. As the NFT is minted, a trigger is sent back, updating the DB to reflect the NFT as processed and minted, tied to the customer ID, and reflecting the NFT’s information. From here, our APIs then reflect that NFT back into the customer’s environment that preexists on the brand’s website (think - when you sign into your user account on any online store you’ve ever purchased from), and the NFT is displayed to that customer. Hopefully this adds extra context to the user/product flow image included on the application.

Specification of the Software or Deliverable:
I have no doubt that Niftmint and Conflux will have a very close relationship through the development process here - and ongoing. For validation of software and deliverables for milestones, I envision that it will be us successfully demonstrating to you we have built our milestones as outlined: Integrating our customer and frontend APIs and workflows onto the Conflux blockchain for automated/batched NFT minting and custody on test-net, main-net, and then live full-feature integration onto ecommerce websites. The first two milestones I envision will be technical demonstration to you and your team, and the final milestone will be evidenced by the live product and verifiable transaction volume.

Community Growth and Traction KPIs:
Thinking of ourselves like a Stripe/Coinbase type of company, community growth is not particularly applicable to our company (No one ever goes to Stripe meetup events :grinning:). That being said, our traction KPIs will definitely be verifiable transaction volume using the Conflux network. Since our business model is based around a small NFT sale percentage paid by the brand (think: merchant processing fee), our interests are mutually aligned around valid purchasing of NFTs - and having that traffic go through the Conflux network. Like I said, I envision us and Conflux being in lock-step through this process and beyond, and so any/all deliverables being infinitely accessible and verifiable.

Thank you again for your questions! Looking forward to hearing back soon!

2 Likes
#16

Been talking with web3 and non web3 aware individuals about NFT use cases and one that seems to resonate the most is integration with web2 like your proposal. I often use the analogy of rewards programs, tiers, or early access (think exclusive items like cosmetics, supreme, graphics cards) can be tied to an NFT, and then if it’s no longer useful to the individual, it can be sold on the market.

1 Like
#17

Hi! Welcome to Conflux.

My question is: Are there any brands that have confirmed to release NFT on your platform? Can you tell us the number of brands and the amount of NFTs they plan to release?

We have observed that some platform projects are not being used by users after they have been developed, which is not the result we expect to see.

Please DM @Grants_Committee in private if it is considered trade secrets.

1 Like
#18

Hey @Coolbit!

An important distinction here is that we’re not building a platform, we’re building an integration. People won’t be going to niftmint.com to buy and sell NFTs, the NFT minting, purchase, and custody will all take place on a brands website. A major problem with platform projects - like you stated - is they try and raise money to launch an NFT marketplace, and then just can’t get customers. That’s not our business.

Our business is to integrate NFT minting, selling, and purchasing directly into brands website. Imagine you’re on Nike.com, purchasing some sneakers, and you have the ability to add an NFT of your sneakers, all right there in the Nike user experience. No third party marketplace, no clicking out to another website - it all takes place in the Nike customer shopping cart checkout flow.

So just like for users who pay via credit card online using Stripe don’t go to Stripe.com, users who purchase NFTs won’t be going to Niftmint.com.

We are working with 3 brands right now getting them prepared to enable ‘buy-now’ options for NFT on their websites. They will be selling those NFTs to their (large and existing) user bases - Niftmint won’t be driving traffic or attempting to get customers.

I hope this provides more clarity!

1 Like
#19

Hey @Grants_Committee! I understand there were some updates being rolled out to the grands process, but we’d love to pick up where we left off and continue the conversation. We have some great things coming down the pipe, and so would love to be able to start pointing more focus in the direction of building on top of/into Conflux!

Let us know what questions you have, and we’re hopeful for a partnership between us and Conflux soon!

Best,

Mike

1 Like
#20

Hi @Grants_Committee, we’d love to get the process kickstarted again with you. We think Niftmint is an ideal fit for Conflux, especially considering we are communicating with large brands wanting to get into NFTs and have our Niftmint product facilitate. These Brands are looking to enter the China market with NFTs.

How can we get this process re-started?

#21

Hi Jonathan, we are in the process of revamping the grants process, please check out these documents:

Get a Grant to Build on Conflux

CONFLUX ECOSYSTEM GRANTS 2022
https://forum.conflux.fun/t/conflux-ecosystem-grants-2022

TECHNICAL GRANTS APPLICATION TEMPLATE
https://forum.conflux.fun/t/technical-grants-application-template

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