Are you really serious about your marketing efforts? 🤔
Do you want to reach millennials on a platform they are really engaged on?
If yes, that’s great. In this article, we’ll be sharing with you the seven benefits of Snapchat for Business. If your target audience is millennials, this article will come in very handy. ✅
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6 Benefits of Snapchat for Businesses
Snapchat is largely regarded as a social platform for young people, and businesses tend to neglect it in favor of other platforms. That’s completely understandable, as Instagram has overtaken Snapchat and pretty much implemented the same features.
However, that doesn’t mean Snapchat is no longer used…
The platform still has 300 million+ monthly active users, of which 188 million are active each day.
This makes Snapchat a great platform for your business to reach a younger audience who may have an interest in what you sell.
To help you make a better clear decision on whether Snapchat would be ideal for your business, here are six benefits of Snapchat.
Benefit #1: Create Limited Time Offers
Companies can take advantage of the social platform’s short viewing timeframe by creating limited time offers.
How?
You take a Snapchat of an item or items that are currently on sale, a promotion, or a special discount code, which can only be redeemed for a limited time.
This can create a sense of urgency and it may lead to business growth.
Why is this? Customers’ attention spans are getting shorter and shorter, down to an estimated average of 12 seconds. For Gen Zers it’s even lower, 8 seconds. With such a short time frame to make an impression, companies require a medium that can make an impact quickly. Snapchat is perfect for this purpose.
The platform only allows users to view a video or image for one to ten seconds. This has the effect of making everything appear more significant, as a person has a limited time to view content before it is deleted forever.
Benefit #2: Add Links
The most useful way to market on Snapchat is also the simplest. The network enables all users to add links to their posts directly, making it easy to share content with potential customers. It is also possible to track how many clicks your posts generates if you create trackable shortened URLs.
After you’ve recorded or taken a picture for your Snapchat, you’ll see a hyperlink paperclip icon on the right, just above the timer. Clicking this icon will allow you to enter a URL. After this, you’ll see a preview of the page it will direct users to. Confirm the link and post your snap. Your followers will now be able to see it. They can then swipe up in order to navigate to the link’s destination. You’ll want to give them clear instructions to swipe up too, otherwise, they may not realise.
Benefit #3: Grab Attention with Snap Ads
Snapchat Ads allow you to reach a unique larger audience outside of your own following. Whether your objective is to raise awareness, increase consideration or drive action, Snapchat Ads allows you to do so, with ease.
One of the things Snapchat Ads allows it’s users to do is create custom filters. This is a fantastic idea for events, brick-and-mortar businesses and even local campaigns that want to raise awareness.
To make things easier for its users, Snapchat for Business provides a full video editing suite called Snap Publisher. It enables one to create interesting ads in no time at all. Another benefit is that you don’t need to download or install additional software to be able to use it, it’s all web-based.
Snapchat can also be used in other imaginative and flexible ways. For example, you can give a behind the scenes look at your organization. Alternatively, you can use it to keep in touch with people who are interested in your products or services.
Benefit #4: Garner a Loyal Following
Building brand loyalty is crucial, as repeat customers help drive a company’s success over the long term. This network makes it possible to extend special offers to your followers exclusively, keeping them connected to your services or products. This is a targeted way to keep customers returning for more – one of the many creative uses of this creative social media application.
With time, you’ll find your brand garnering a loyal following on Snapchat because it benefits from being in something akin to an “inner circle”. The final outcome is that followers begin to feel a closer, deeper connection to your brand. Snapchat’s casual environment lets brands “be themselves” and earn the trust (and subsequently the loyalty) of audiences.
Benefit #5: Exclusive Sneak Peek of New Products
Snapchat can be used to give an exclusive sneak peek of new products or services you’re offering. You could send visual announcements when the new product or service becomes available, building up the hype. To encourage others to purchase and increase curiosity, you could offer your loyal Snapchat followers special discounts and coupons.
Benefit #6: Target Millennials and the Z-Generation with Lenses
We’ve mentioned that Snapchat caters to a younger crowd, so if you need a corresponding social media strategy, this network is an extremely valuable tool. The vast majority of Snapchat’s more than 30 million worldwide users is in the 13-25 age group. It can help your brand access this demographic and expand its recognition not only by millennials, but also within the Z-generation.
To this end, we’d definitely recommend the lenses, one of Snapchat’s most beloved and often used features. These are particularly interesting to young people. They are effects that can be applied to snaps, which add fun innovative elements to videos and images.
You’ve definitely seen at least some – adding cat moustaches or rabbit ears to human faces and such.  What does this have to do with your brand? You can create and submit your own sponsored lens. Of course, this requires more efforts, time, and money than some other options, but it can also prove the most beneficial. By creating something that engages users directly, your brand will be seen in a new and fresh way that is also completely in line with how they were using Snapchat before. This helps you raise brand awareness and trust.
You’ll need to add your logo to the lens either way before submitting it because this is part of the network’s ad policies. You can use the lens in your marketing campaigns via Ad Manager after its submission and approval.
Unchartered Territory
Snapchat’s opportunities for business remain somewhat unexplored despite the network’s being released almost 8 years ago. Brands have overrun platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, yet hesitate to use Snapchat for their promotional needs. This is perplexing, as quite a few of them are keen on reaching younger audiences.
We believe the somewhat lacking enthusiasm for Snapchat is due to many companies just not understanding how it works. This is a shortcoming this article has aimed to overcome.
Of course, it goes without saying that Snapchat themselves are more than willing to overcome this hesitation. Now that Snapchat For Business has been released, businesses and marketers have plenty of tools at their disposal to use it in a number of ways. The network even offers useful guides on aspects that distinguish it from competitors and how it can be used by its audience to promote brands.
Other than the above tools, it provides several different ways for brands to be expressed, which we find to be its most superior feature. Whether you’re a small company that just wants to raise awareness of its brand or an organization with greater resources, there’s always an option for you on Snapchat.
One last tip – Snapchat is not like its more traditional social media brethren, like Facebook, in another important respect. If you’re a business advertising on Facebook, you have to post to your profile regularly, because users don’t “like” stale profiles. With Snapchat, there is no option to review a profile before “friending” a brand or contact. You can choose when you want to post, if at all, and this won’t reflect on your contacts and potential clients.
We think this is a huge advantage because a marketer is able to post only when they have news worth sharing versus having to post incessantly just to keep the profile “current.” The former option creates a more authentic experience for the brand and its audience.
Our Final Word
If none of the benefits described in this article are compelling enough for your brand to join Snapchat, we recommend registering just to safeguard your brand name before someone else does. At the moment, the sign-up process is the same for companies. Use your first and last name as the company name because it takes some time for changes to take effect. There could soon come a time when Snapchat users can switch to a business account for extra benefits, an option that recently became available on Instagram.
Whilst Snapchat might not be suitable for all brands, it certainly is worthwhile looking into if your target audience is millennials. We’d love to hear your thoughts about Snapchat in the comments below.
