Cryptocurrencies only hold value because people believe in them and recognize their worth. The more people who own a cryptocurrency, the more likely it is to become widely adopted and rise in value. Airdrops are effective due to the “endowment effect,” a phenomenon in which people will ascribe value to things merely because they own them.

By executing a bounty airdrop, a startup can create mass awareness about their project, token sale or pre-ICO with minimal cost to them. Social media campaigns allow the project to become visible to people who would otherwise never recognize its existence. Airdrops can also create a vast network of users who are motivated to push a project’s success by doing things together like winning community votings for exchange listings.