For many years, businesses and entrepreneurs have used social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to expand their brand reach and generate more revenue. While massively popular, the video-first platform Snapchat hasn’t always been used as frequently for business purposes as other social media channels.
This, however, is changing. Marketers are waking up to the fact that Snapchat is one of the most important channels to grow your brand and reach a highly lucrative and influential market.
Where many advertisers, marketers, and business owners go wrong, however, is assuming that all you need to know is how to make a Snapchat lens, filter, or story to be successful. There is so much more to this platform, and understanding the audience and the elements are vital to avoid being ineffective or annoying.
We’ll be looking at how to create engaging Snapchat content that showcases your brand effectively and increases your market reach. Before we begin, let’s examine why Snapchat advertising is so important for any brand.
The Importance of Snapchat For Your Brand
As mentioned, Snapchat has previously lagged behind the other platforms regarding business usage. This might have been because of it’s very young demographic, or even a bit of myopia from marketers. This is changing, though, and Snapchat is now being seen as a highly effective marketing tool. Here are a few reasons why.
- Snapchat Stats
- Daily active users: 319 million
- Snapchat users in the U.S.: 87.3 million
- Snaps Created Everyday (Photos & Videos): Over 5 billion
- Average Time Spent on Snapchat per Daily Active User: Over 30 minutes
- The number of Snapchat Daily Video Views: 18 billion
- The average Snapchat user visits the app 18 times daily
- Less competition (For now)
While all businesses have a Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Linkedin presence, many are not on Snapchat. Although this is changing as more marketers become aware of the benefits, it is a great time for marketers to take advantage of this and establish a unique brand presence. Additionally, due to the lack of competition, you might be one of a few brands advertising your specific product or service, which will give you much more attention than the other platforms do.
- Engaging content
Snapchat is a lot more engaging than the other platforms. While some platforms might have more users and posts, very few have the same level of content engagement as Snapchat. If you market smartly, this means you’ll have a very captive and engaged audience.
How To Engage Your Audience On Snapchat
First, you’ll need to set up your Snapchat account and go through the tutorial. It’s always a good idea to take your time to make sure you understand the basics of how to take snaps and use all of the many great features Snapchat has to offer. Once you’re familiar with the platform, however, you need to learn an essential skill – How to create engaging and not annoying content for Snapchat.
Product Promotion
Highlighting specific product ranges is one of the best ways to engage your Snapchat audience. Whether it’s a new product or something you want to promote specifically to the young demographic, choose a product or product range and create a campaign around it.
You can create Snaps of your product being demonstrated or maybe even show a new and innovative way to showcase your product. Another great idea is to give your audience tips on pairing your product with other products. This works particularly well with clothing brands.
Importantly, you need to shine a light on your brand when you do a product promotion – Make sure that the content is true to your brand message and includes all the elements associated with your brand.
Brand And Business Showcase
Another way to create engaging and compelling content is by showcasing your business and brand. Snapchat is perfect for showing your business’s human, fun, and exciting side.
You can include employees in Snapchat Stories candidly chatting about their daily tasks and roles. You can also showcase new product launches similarly by getting happy customers involved and posting snaps about how happy they are with the new product.
It is important to note that overly scripted or formal Snaps and Stories will come across as annoying and will not be received well by this audience. On the other hand, the more adlib, fun, and natural the content, the more engaging it will be.
Behind The Scenes
A great way to ensure natural and engaging content is to do backstage or behind-the-scenes content. Show your audience what a day in production looks like, or even better, take them on a journey through the product development phase.
The benefit here is twofold – Firstly, you engage the audience and bring them closer to your brand, and secondly, you can use their feedback on the content to gauge the reception of the new products.
The more natural and spontaneous the content, the less corny and annoying it will be. This audience may be young, but they are the most sensitive to anything contrived and staged!
Snapchat Takeover
Another great technique is called a Snapchat takeover. Here you allow an influencer to kidnap your Snapchat account for the day. This ensures fresh and engaging content. If you’re concerned about an influencer keeping your messaging on brand, you can chat with them beforehand about what is and isn’t appropriate.
The influencer should ideally be related to your industry. It’s a great way to gain traction for new events or product launches. Snapchat takeovers are usually high-energy, impromptu, and lots of fun – Precisely what your audience wants.
In closing, remember what this platform is all about – Fun, youth, excitement, and visual engagement. Have fun with it, be as natural as possible, and most importantly, be engaging!
