Should Your Business Give Snapchat a Chance?

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Metrics like reach and engagement are getting stale with Facebook dropping the gate on organic reach, and practically morphing into a pay-to-play platform. Not to say that’s unfair, because obviously what rules, and forever will, on social media are great stories. It’s the compelling content that yields authentic likes and shares, and is being talked about without having to pay for it to go around.

So what’s a brand got to do when visibility isn’t as great as it used to? To survive means capturing the attention of millions of people (well at least your target market) and building a presence on where they are.

Thinking of using Snapchat for marketing? Here’s a quick look into the platform and why you should consider it for brand promotion:

A Young Audience

Snapchat is one of the newest and fastest-growing social media platforms with over 100 million active users and over 10 billion video views daily. In the U.S., more than 60% of 13 to 34 year-old smartphone users are on Snapchat. As if the statistics aren’t astounding enough; you still need to ask yourself whether this demographic forms a part of your target market.

 

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As with any social media platform, Snapchat can help build a community for your brand. You start off by sharing stories. Storytelling is the core of great content. Snapchat’s primary content format, snippet videos (stories), will easily help your brand get noticed.

Videos are highly engaging and can easily capture the full attention of the viewer. The only challenge is to make sure your story is impactful. How else are you going to get views and shares on your stories?

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Crowdsourced Content

One of Snapchat’s cool features is live event coverage -- not merely for brand-produced content, but crowdsourced content. How awesome would it be for your audience to capture moments as they unfold and for those videos to be compiled in your Snapchat story? This way, you’re not the only content creator (#PeoplePower).

Snapchat also offers a geofilter feature, which is great for local event marketing. Here’s how you can create a geofilter for your business.

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(images from Snapchat)

Big Brand Strategy

More than just the 10-second stories and pictures, Snapchat also works well for blogs and articles. CNN introduces news articles from stories:

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Any viewer can tap on a story to read the article and share it to their friends. BuzzFeed and Mashable use the same method.

Meanwhile, NASA shares updates straight from the International Space Station:

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Fastfood giant McDonald’s rolled out their own filter, practically initiating engagement from customers who visited their restaurants. This is how you do it big brand style, as more and more businesses are striving to be relevant to people’s lives on social media. Make sure it’s enjoyable for your audience because this translates into a valuable and authentic experience for them. You can maximize the opportunity to market your brand without being too “in your face”.

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Snapchat Metrics

As young as the app is, literally (it was launched in 2011), metrics aren’t as rigid as marketers expect them to be. Currently, Snapchat only offers story views and screenshots. As far as engagement goes, that’s all you’re going to get.

To top it off, there’s no follower count. If you’re a startup struggling to grow a community, right now, you can only rely on people viewing your stories. Sigh, remember when Facebook didn’t have metrics like organic reach and link clicks?

There are plenty of other big brands and organizations that reach their community through Snapchat. After reading about what you can do on the app, do you think Snapchat and your business are the right fit?

 

Posted 18 May, 2016

Maita Piedra

Social Media at Freelancer.com

Obsessed with compelling digital content. Most likely lurking around Facebook Insights and Twitter Analytics rather than my neighbor's backyard BBQ. Probably smarter than the average 90's kid/millennial. Hypercritical-perfectionist, caffeine-infused beach bum.

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