Why Businesses Should Call The Shots with Snapchat in 2016

Before

Once upon a time, there was a hotcha-hotcha safe-sexting app meant for the college going crowd. Turns out, you could post anything and everything on it without compunction, thanks to the self-destructive nature of its messages.

And given that messages disappeared in a matter of seconds, 10 seconds precisely, the app happened to resonate well with younger audiences, specifically for sending the pics, meant for your eyes only.

After   

Now with a new update in place any pretense of Snapchat being a  safe-sexting app will soon go out of the window.  As per the update, snaps can be replayed and also screenshots taken of them on payment of a small sum.

Huh! Yes! Can’t imagine someone taking a screenshot of your sexy text message and then mindlessly putting that into circulation? Goodness gracious !

Notwithstanding the new update, which would ensure that your app’s hallmark feature becomes history, Snapchat is still America’s second most popular social networking app: Source Edison research.

Nearly 8% of respondents cited Snapchat as the platform they love to visit often, besides Facebook.  By the way, Facebook with 61% user base is topping the charts.

 Other interesting Stats that’s spawning the interest of businesses in Snapchat’s favor include:

• 150 million active users and 10 billion daily video views
• Snapchat is on the verge of overtaking both Twitter and Facebook in popularity
• Over 60% of U.S. 13 to 34-year-old smartphone users are Snapchatters

Besides sexting, the app has a nice assortment of old and new features, which has earned it an incredible fan-following both among youth and businesses  targeting them.

Some of its amazing features include Live Events, Discover, One-on-One chats, Audio and Video Calls and Notes and so forth.

Wish to read about these outstanding features in detail. Here we go:

#1. Geofilters for Live Events and Special Occasions  

Imagine you are gonna host a huge fashion event, but unfortunately, which your followers and supporters won’t be able to make it to the event. Never mind!  Enter Snapchat’s real-time ‘On- Demand Geofilter’ feature, which will allow your followers to have direct access to all your live events.

Be it product launches, trade shows, concerts, or any other major marketing and branding events, your target audience will be able to see the events live, through a series of snaps and videos.

On the other hand, you can even request all your show attendees, using the Geo-filter feature, to send out snaps of the event.

However, the only criterion while sending snaps is that your Geo-fence must be large enough: somewhere between 20,000 and 5 million square feet.

The other major plus point of this feature is that businesses can download the snaps and cross promote them on other social networks. You can even encourage your customers with On-Demand Geofilters to do the same.

So, take advantage of On-Demand Geofilter if you are really keen on spreading the word about your business or event, and at the same time wish to keep your people updated.

#2. Captions for Video Content  for Discover Publishers

Imagine you are in the middle of a meeting,  and suddenly, a random video ad pops up and plays out loud on your smartphone, scaring the bejesus out of you.  And before you manage to put it off, all eyes are on you.

No more! Thanks to Facebook’s automated caption tool,  noisy video ads will make a disappearing act. Taking a leaf out of Facebook’s book, even Snapchat has quickly added a caption button to videos.

The feature, so far meant only for Discover publishers (Snapchat has deals with 20 publishers)will help them add caption text to their Snap content.   Image source

In short, videos that get displayed on Mashable, Buzzfeed,  CNN, Vice, Yahoo News, Comedy Central, National Geographic, Daily Mail, ESPN, Food Network, Cosmopolitan, among many others, will have captions from now on, providing users with necessary context, in the process.

Moreover, additions and deletions are possible in the manually uploaded captions.  Further, the caption  can be turned on and off using the speech bubble toggle appearing right at the bottom of the screen.

The new functionality aims to give life to video News Feeds that appear without a sound. More importantly, it will put an end to those annoying feed-based mobile video ads that are designed to play loudly.

However, the jury is still out on the availability of similar tools on other Snapchat video contents such as Live Stories or individual user videos.

#3. Develop One-on-One Relationship With Users

Unlike other social media channels, Snapchat enables one-on-one communication with individual followers.  In other words, you can send content directly to the individual customer provided s/he is following you.

For instance, you can send special discount coupons or a hand written thank you note to an XYZ customer who has been a relentless buyer of your goods.

How does this help? Simple, it helps you bond with your customer on a personal level, who in turn, touched by your gracious gesture, might turn himself in as your lifetime customer.

What’s more, you can even slip in Snapchat stickers while holding one-on-one chats with your customers. Snapchat has come up with a gamut of stickers – over 200 --- for this purpose.  Just tap the sticker buttons, and those relating to the words you have keyed in first will soon pop up.

Source

#4.  Calling Customers Made Easy With SnapPhone

Now Snapchat’s chat interface can also be used for making video and audio calls. For this, you simply need to tap on the icons. For audio calls, tap the phone icon; for video calls, tap the video camera icon.

What’s more, you can even send photos, that appear in the chat window, while making calls, not to mention 10-second thumbnail-sized video and audio messages.        

#5.  A Perfect Platform to Host Contests and Promotions and More

Hosting events, contests, and promotional campaigns  are one typical strategy applied by brands to draw customers, like bees to honey.

For customers, on the other hand, participating in these events mean winning rewards and more. When it comes to Snapchat, you can simply plan giveaways such as discount coupons for followers who made it a point to watch your entire Snapchat story.

GrubHub.com has made of good job of Snapchat community engagement initiative with a gamut of promotions, exclusive deals, and contests. For once, it even rewarded its followers with promotional discounts for viewing their selective snaps.

Image Source

In another event, GrubHub was hunting interns with Snapchat Skillz via Snapchat Stories feature. For this, Snapchat used a six image slideshow, explaining the entire entry process, complete with the last date of application submissions.

Image Source

Such campaigns help you endorse brand’s personality and opens the door for two-way communication.

 #6.  Backstage Realty Bytes to Boost Traffic   

Unfamiliarity spells intrigue and respect.  So get behind the scenes, once in a while, to display your company culture.

If anything, it provides unique content for your website, and also builds a strong follower base because people are inquisitive by nature and love to know what’s  happening behind the scenes.

So, capture memorable moments like office parties, company outings, etc.   And going by Snapchat’s self-destructive messaging nature,  you can keep introducing newer things to keep the intrigue factor alive.

#7. Influencer Marketing Becomes Easy

Snapchat has a good number of influential people who could prove to be excellent evangelists for your brand.  They can easily galvanize their followers into following your brand.

More than that, these influencers can help you touch demographics, untouched before.

Plus, some even help you come up with ingenious videos, which can further enhance your brand’s popularity and personality.

#8. Obtaining Feedback From Users

Of course, Facebook and Twitter are best bets for customer feedback, because their feedbacks are quantifiable, which is not the case of Snapchat, what with snaps and videos disappearing in the blink of an eye.

That said, seeking customer feedback on Snapchat can be fun.

One could seek short and sweet feedbacks in the form of stickers and short videos once the event is over. This is will help you bond with your customers even after the event.

Rounding Up

Snapchat’s top of the line business-friendly features is making it the social media network of choice for many businesses, this year.

Is your business using Snapchat? If yes, do go ahead and share your experiences with us. We are all ears.