INSIGHTS & NEWS

Should my business be on Snapchat?

Table of contents

Snapchat has been steadily growing in popularity over the last few years. Interest from businesses has been steadily gaining momentum, especially with the likes of high profile digital marketer Gary Vaynerchuck promoting it as the next big thing. It can be hard to know what you should do with Snapchat and if you should be on there at all.

For the uninitiated, Snapchat is a phone app that allows users to send photos or short videos to each other that once viewed by the recipient, disappear forever. There’s some additional features like being able to write text or draw a picture over the top of your video, add a graphic (filter) or even some awesome real time video effects that match up to your face. The users are predominantly young with approximately half under the age of 24, but that’s slowly changing as popularity increases.

It’s a quick bit of entertainment from your friends or people you follow. A further indication of the media world we live in these days as younger generations gravitate towards bite size pieces of content that can capture their attention.

It’s a growing platform

A year ago you may have been able to argue that Snapchat was a bit of a fad and would pass. It was cool, but what value did it offer to an older generation or dare I say it, marketers?

In 2016 that’s a tough argument to sell with Snapchat the number one free app on the iTunes app store for some time. People are on Snapchat, and it’s only going to grow. It’s estimated there are over 100 million active Snapchat users daily that send over 9000 snaps per second! Not bad for an app that launched late 2011. Facebook even offered to purchase Snapchat back in 2013 for three billion dollars, and they turned it down…

Is your demographic hanging out on Snapchat?

Facebook as much as I hate to admit it, is the ‘oldies’ social media channel these days with over half of it’s users over the age of 30. So if your target market is younger than that you should be looking at channels such as Instagram and Snapchat. The content you put out needs to be appropriate though. It’s not a ‘sell sell sell’ platform. It is great for building brand awareness and brand loyalty. Show the lighter side of your business or your people. Have fun with it, as that’s what the users of Snapchat want to see, reality.

Perfect for events

If you’re running an event, promoting a Snapchat channel allows users to get up close and personal or behind the scenes. You can expand your audience infinitely and perhaps the next time the event is on they will be more likely to attend. Showing areas or things that the general public couldn’t regularly access is of high interest. It can totally extend beyond an event though. If you’re a restaurant why not take your users into the kitchen and show them how you masterfully create that signature dish.

Keep it light

Make sure you enjoy creating content on Snapchat, and that will shine through to your viewers. You’ve got roughly 10 seconds to make an impression on someone. You can certainly give offers on Snapchat but make them genuine and perhaps in thanks for their viewership. Do not take for granted a user that was willing to add you in the first place by making them regret their decision.

WHAT’S NEXT?

If you like this post you’re gonna love…

post-button-prev post-button-next