Meme Coin Creation: What I Learned

A few months ago, I thought about how meme coins make huge gains, with the creators making the most money. So I decided to launch my own meme coin.

I chose to create it on the Base network because Solana was having issues at the time. I also considered TON, but there's less money there. Base uses EVM, which means the tools would work on Ethereum or other EVM networks too.

First, I wanted to make sure the token would score 100/100 on checkers. This meant creating a contract where the creator has no control after launch, and locking or burning the liquidity pool (LP) to prevent rug pulls.

I learned that a good meme coin needs a website, Twitter, and Telegram, along with the meme itself and lots of images. After launching the pool, you need to pay to add your logo and links on DexTools and DexScreener.

I decided on a stealth launch instead of a presale. It's common to put 100% of the tokens in the pool at creation, or maybe keep up to 7% for yourself.

How does the developer make money if all tokens are in the pool? They buy back some tokens right after creating the pool, when the price is lowest.

I planned to put all tokens and 0.4 ETH in the pool. If I bought tokens worth 0.4 ETH right after launch, I'd get 50% of all tokens. If I wanted 75%, I'd need to buy 1.2 ETH worth.

The total cost for launching a meme coin, including website creation, pool setup, buying back 50% of tokens, and paying for listings, came to about $5,300.

I learned it's better to spread the tokens across many wallets instead of keeping them in one, as large holdings scare potential buyers. Ideally, no wallet should hold more than 2% of all tokens.

To make everything look good on bubble maps (which show connections between token holders), you need to spread ETH across multiple wallets and buy from each one on Uniswap.

Bubble Map

For a long-lasting token, you need to create pumps by buying tokens, then dump to take profits, and simulate activity between pumps. Doing this manually is impossible, so you need a market maker. I couldn't afford to hire one, so I decided to write my own market maker bot. I created a wallet generator and a script for initial buyback.

When I launched, sniper bots bought a bunch of tokens in the first minute. I had to cancel that pool and create a new one. On the second try, only two sniper bots bought small amounts. I ran my script to buy tokens from 100 wallets, then burned the LP and paid for listings.

Users came and bought some tokens in the first half-day, but most sold after that, and the token didn't grow further. I improved my bot to do wash trading and create pumps, but I realized that pumps in older tokens don't get noticed. To grow further, I'd need to figure out how to buy effective advertising, which I don't know how to do yet and can't afford.

Basically, it seems you can't just launch a token and make money without investing in advertising.
I've paused my meme coin experiment for now. I'd be interested in continuing with a partner who has crypto traffic or experience in advertising meme coins.

I won't share the token, but I'm happy to answer other technical questions in the comments. If you're interested in the market maker script or partnership, message me on Telegram: akamitch