Since its inception in 2011, Snapchat has been considered a social media platform for teens due to its playful and whimsical nature. However, research shows that this is not the case anymore, and the medium is slowly gaining ground among other demographics as well.
Snapchat+ was launched in 2022 where paying customers could subscribe to the service. In September this year, the platform recorded 5 million subscribers—a phenomenal feat. These subscribers are paying $3.99 a month, which is set to collectively earn the platform over $230 million in revenue this year.
How Snapchat can help businesses
Snapchat reaches its audiences quickly and with minimal curated content. Comprising a host of features and filters, the platform has much to offer businesses that don’t want to spend too much time thinking about content.
A convincing statistic is that 60% of Snapchat users are said to make impulse purchases. Therefore, businesses should be thinking of pushing their wares across Snapchat to increase sales. User-generated content is the best way to do this, as it carries the credibility factor. When users create content, it means that they trust your brand, and using this content as promotional material also eliminates the hassle of businesses having to create content.
Snapchat also contains various ad formats, such as snap ads, story ads, AR lenses, and filters. Any of these can be used cleverly to promote brands through giveaways and exciting offers. The key is to keep the message fun, short, and entertaining.
A superb example of Snapchat being used by a business aimed at Gen Zs and millennials is when Bumble, the dating app where women message first, partnered with Cosmopolitan and Snapchat for their campaign that was aimed at 18-35-year-olds.
Against the backdrop of the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdowns, the magazine leveraged Snapchat to share a sequence of takeover movies that revolved around ‘Lockdown Love Lessons’. This promotion, which was just part of the entire campaign, was extremely successful as it drew the appropriate audience who were looking to connect with the opposite sex safely during the pandemic.
Advertising on Snapchat
Advertising on Snapchat is quite straightforward, but picking the appropriate form of Snapchat advertising should be your focus.
These ads are usually to be seen in between organic content and can be images or videos. The duration can be between 3 seconds and 3 minutes.
Snapchat advertisements can be Single-image or Video Ads, Collection ads, Dynamic Collection Ads, Story Ads, Commercial Ads, AR lens Ads, or Filter Ads. E-commerce sales conversions are usually facilitated by Collection ads, where businesses need to upload their product catalogue to Snapchat Ads Manager. Four clickable product slates at the bottom of the user screen present the products that can be perused.
Dynamic Collection Ads are automatically created when businesses upload their product catalogue to Snapchat. This allows you to customise your campaign depending on your targets.
3 to 20 ads in a sequence make up the Story Ads. With a high level of retention in customer attention (supposedly 100%), these are highly effective.
Surefire ad views are made through Commercial Ads. These are viewed as part of Snapchat stories and cannot be skipped by the user. AR Lens Ads or Augmented Reality Lens Ads are akin to sponsored camera filters and are super to launch new products or announce events as they generate excitement.
Filter Ads use fixed images over existing snaps, and can be used to target certain behaviour-driven customer segments and demographics.
Age-wise
Contrary to popular belief, Snapchat is not only primarily used by Gen Z and Gen Alphas. In fact, according to Hootsuite, people over the age of 50 are Snapchat’s fastest-growing audience. In 2021, the usage of the platform by people over the age of 50 grew by as much as 25%. Statistics also show that 3.7% of Snapchat’s advertising audience is over the age of 50.
While 39% of Snapchat users are between the ages of 18 and 24, the platform is clearly growing in attractiveness amongst a wider age range with Hootsuite also noting that Snapchat has the greatest age gap between users in comparison to other social media platforms.
Snapchat your way into the next level of marketing
On the whole, Snapchat boasts 306 million daily active users, but only a staggering 1% of businesses use it to market their products. This leaves the market wide open for use.
Marketers hold such a significant opportunity here within the palm of their hands, so leveraging this across the demographics is sure to unveil more opportunities for sales growth.
Now’s the time to start clicking.
(Anouk De Silva)