By Nat Ives
Grayscale Investments LLC, a digital currency asset manager, has named Deborah Bussière as its first chief marketing officer.
Grayscale, which offers over-the-counter funds focused on bitcoin and other digital currencies, had $53 billion in assets under management as of May 12, according to the company. Responsibility for marketing was previously shared internally, with external support from Vested LLC, its advertising and public relations agency of record.
Previously, Ms. Bussière was global chief marketing officer at Broadridge Financial Solutions Inc., a financial-technology provider of investing, governance, and communications tools. She had earlier been a marketing consultant to startups including Grayscale and chief marketing officer for the Americas at Ernst & Young.
Ms. Bussière said she intended to help Grayscale educate investors about digital currency as it continues to quickly evolve. "We understand how important it is to navigate the many perceptions and misperceptions that exist," she said.
She joins the company following the January promotion of Michael Sonnenshein to chief executive officer at Grayscale, where he promised to bolster the leadership team and capitalize on the company's growth in 2020.
Her appointment to the C-suite at Grayscale comes, too, as digital currencies occupy the spotlight more than ever, most recently as the subject of a "Saturday Night Live" skit starring Elon Musk last month and an enthusiastic conference in Miami earlier this month. The "laser eyes" social-media meme for bitcoin enthusiasts was adopted this week by the president of El Salvador, which this week approved bitcoin as legal tender.
But the currencies are also volatile, buffeted by forces including tweets by Mr. Musk and the sentiment in Reddit forums such as WallStreetBets. Bitcoin, dogecoin and other cryptocurrencies saw their value decline on Friday, continuing a monthlong drop, after Mr. Musk posted a cryptic tweet implying loss of love for bitcoin, including "#bitcoin" and a broken-heart emoji.
The crosscurrents are a challenge, according to Ms. Bussière. "Perception is reality," she said. "That's a fact of life."
But she said her response to such external factors will be Marketing 101, with a consistent message at its core. "We're monitoring real-time tweets, news breaks, price fluctuations, market valuations," Ms. Bussière said. "But it's like when you're running a race. If you want to win you're not constantly looking back at who's behind you because if you do that you're losing valuable milliseconds."
Marketing cryptocurrency also depends in part on the audience, Ms. Bussière added.
"If you're in the digital currency and crypto space, it can be Reddit and it can be all the kids that are out there," she said. "Certainly if you go to talk to your Great Aunt Edna about her perception of digital currencies, that's a whole different vantage point...Grayscale has a huge opportunity to own that narrative."
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
June 10, 2021 06:30 ET (10:30 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2021 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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