I Built A Crypto Wallet In 2 Weeks

Paul Sokolov

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Published: May 3rd, 2022

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Paul Sokolov

Founder, Guarda Wallet

Founders

Employees

Guarda Wallet

guarda.com

from Lissabon, Portugal

started August 2017

Founders

Employees

Discover what tools Paul recommends to grow your business!

Discover what books Paul recommends to grow your business!

Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder (Incerto) Nassim Nicholas Taleb

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Hi all! My name is Paul Sokolov and I am the CEO of Guarda Wallet. Initially, Guarda Wallet was released as a single-currency wallet for Ethereum on Android. It was back in 2017. Now Guarda Wallet is much more than that.

Our main goal is to build an ecosystem of products and services that covers the full range of crypto-asset and financial tools. Essentially, this means that we want to provide a place for our users to fully manage their funds in a simple, secure, and seamless manner in a single place. This way we are providing a very new format of managing one's finances which is super convenient, decentralized, and transparent. Moreover, such a service will, for sure, get rid of the drawbacks of traditional services, like high fees, middlemen, and long transaction processing time.

With Guarda, you can do a bunch of stuff with your crypto holdings besides just storing, sending, and receiving.

Hundreds of thousands of assets are supported, along with additional services such as crypto purchase and exchange service, token generator, crypto loan and borrow service, HRA and multi-signature addresses support, and much more.

Specific features are supported, also. So, when it comes to functionality and feature richness, I believe Guarda Wallet is an outstanding wallet. There are no other wallets with such an extensive list of supported functions and services.

Also, we are currently participating in various networks by validating blocks and securing the network. For example, we have our validator/ block producer nodes, staking pools, for Ethereum, Cardano, FIO, Tezos, Harmony, Tron, and Ontology, and we are not going to stop.

What's your backstory and how did you come up with the idea?

At the moment of the wallet creation, I had been involved in the crypto field for quite a long time. I worked in a company operating in the crypto sphere for about 4 years before I created the wallet.

Back then, in 2017, there were not a lot of good crypto wallets.

There weren't any. I used cryptocurrencies quite a lot and I felt like I needed a nice crypto wallet to manage my cryptos. Storing crypto on some accounts on exchanges was quite a hustle, frankly speaking. Registrations account creations, KYC procedures, and stuff. I did need a place to manage and store my crypto funds. That’s how I got the idea to create a crypto wallet - so that I can personally use it. That’s pretty much it.

And I have always been concerned about the privacy and safety of all operations, so when thinking about wallet creation the only option I was looking at was non-custodial storage for crypto.

I have been interested in the crypto field for a long time. I think it's also important to find a sphere you like and operate in it. It may sound banal, but it is indeed a great thing to do something you like. Apart from being Guarda Wallet's main visionary, I am also taking part in a variety of other blockchain-related projects over time and I am an advisor in some crypto projects.

Take us through the process of designing, prototyping, and manufacturing your first product.

Well, to be honest, it was quite banal. One evening, I was just sitting with a pal of mine (who is a co-founder of Guarda Wallet). I have already mentioned above that I used crypto quite a lot and I indeed needed a good wallet so I could manage my holdings. This is how this idea emerged.

So from talking, we went to coding the app, and now here we are! It took us about 2 weeks to do that and to release the first version of the wallet. It was an Ethereum-only wallet available on the Android platform.

Regarding the strategy - once again, we wanted to create a wallet for simple and seamless crypto management that will be easy to use for everyone, even for the ones not super familiar with crypto. The wallet has always been free to use and there is no registration required.

It wasn't long before we started seeing customers. The wallet immediately started growing its audience and gaining popularity. We did receive a huge amount of traffic a few months after the launch, which was awesome. It showed us we were doing something right and there are people out there that need our product.

As for the project funding, it is fully self-funded. Sometime after the launch we partnered up with some companies and started receiving fees which helped a lot.

I would personally never advise you to fund your project using bank loans, investments, or something like that.

Perfectionism should be noticeable in everything, all details are important. Starting with the strategy, finishing with the office lamps. There is no such thing as an unimportant detail.

I do believe that the faster you launch the product - the better. The earlier you start receiving feedback from your clients - the better. This way, you will have time to adjust to the user's needs. So I would say the gap between the well-crafted idea and the product launch should not be more than 2 months. Otherwise, you are standing in the same spot and procrastinating.

Since launch, what has worked to attract and retain customers?

I believe this is a combination of a lot of things. First of all, you have to have something to make users think you are special. You have to keep them entertained. We do a lot of stuff for that: AMA sessions, giveaways, we have also created a section on our website called ‘Blockchain Academy’ to educate novices. We explain various concepts of blockchain there and talk about networks, technologies, etc. Our community does like this a lot.

I do believe that the faster you launch the product - the better. The earlier you start receiving feedback from your clients - the better.

One more important thing- when creating the roadmap, we are always taking into consideration what our community wishes. For example, we see high demand for a particular feature or service - we support it. Of course, if this is something aligned with our mission, views, and strategy.

If you want your users to stay with you you have to make sure the number of bugs goes to zero and the app works as seamlessly as possible and you make it better with each new release. Also, I can but mention it is important to do things better than your competitors. Onboard new features faster, process users’ questions better and faster, make sure the quality of your product is high.

You do want to be friends with the community and make users feel like they matter. That's the key.

The retention rate is a really important indicator of if you're doing your job right and if your users want to use the app in the future.

How are you doing today and what does the future look like?

We are good! We have come a long way since the very beginning of the story to get to the point where we are right now. I'm proud of the project and one thing that makes me particularly happy about it is that the users do find the wallet the best one. It's always nice to know you do something good and make users happy.

Less talk, more action. It is really important not to stop.

We do have huge plans when it comes to new functionalities. Essentially, as I have already mentioned, we would like to create an ecosystem of services that will cover all aspects of financial operations regarding cryptocurrencies. We are doing our best to achieve that.

Through starting the business, have you learned anything particularly helpful or advantageous?

It's always a good idea to assign tasks that encourage your employees to develop the best qualities in themselves. I mean so that you don't search for a particular employee for a certain position. You should do the opposite - look for a suitable position for a particular person. This way this person will unleash their full potential and help the company grow/thrive at the same time. This is a win-win situation for both businesses and workers.

What platform/tools do you use for your business?

Being a crypto wallet (and a platform itself) we don't need any tools to provide our services to users. When it comes to interaction/ communication with users, we have several social media platforms that we mostly use:

Telegram
Twitter
Also, we use Freshdesk to help users solve their problems and answer their questions.

To make more people aware of our services, we use social media like Twitter, Telegram, Medium, and Reddit. We make sure to let the community know about the news, technical updates, exciting collaborations, and stuff.

When it comes to Marketing, it is also a good idea to prepare some marketing materials on new features and partnerships to provide more details on the topic to make sure everyone gets right what’s going on and the explanation is really clear so even novices will get it.

What have been the most influential books, podcasts, or other resources?

For sure, the most influential book would be ‘Antifragile’ by Naseem Taleb. This is by far the best explanation of how you should expect, detect, and prepare yourself for the so-called black swans that you meet all the time on the crypto market.

Advice for other entrepreneurs who want to get started or are just starting out?

Do some research. Pick a big and dynamically growing market, and find a niche for you to operate. Experience is really important so you have to know something about the field you would like to operate in. Before opening a business, you should also work for a while for a company operating in that sphere. This will help you a lot in gaining experience and useful contacts.

Less talk, more action. It is really important not to stop.

I think that the biggest mistake other people are making a lot is that they don’t see the business as a whole. Everything matters. Perfectionism should be noticeable in everything, all details are important. Starting with the strategy, finishing with the office lamps. There is no such thing as an unimportant detail.

When it comes to partners - you should also choose them attentively. You don’t want to put your reputation at risk by providing bad service because of someone else’s mistakes or unreliability.

Are you looking to hire for certain positions right now?

Yes! We are currently working on expansion and there are several open positions right now.