Snapchat is popular among teens and young adults

Which is precisely why it belongs in your marketing strategy. This powerful social media outlet offers a 75 percent chance of conversions compared to Facebook, Instagram, and other platforms.

Learn more about Snapchat marketing and find out why it needs to be part of your marketing strategy.

What is Snapchat?

Like the Zutobi driver’s ed app, Snapchat is a dedicated app for the platform that’s available on iOS and Android devices. Snapchat’s unique feature is that any picture or video that’s sent disappears after a short time.

Originally, Snapchat featured one-on-one photo sharing, but it’s now used for videos, live video chatting, messaging, avatars, and stories. In fact, major brands like Cosmopolitan and Buzzfeed have a news section for short-form content.

Despite being built on disappearing content, Snapchat offers the option to store or screenshot pictures and other media in a private database. You can also use AR lenses, filters, and other tools to tailor your content.

How to Include Snapchat in Marketing

Snapchat should be part of your social media marketing strategy, especially if you have a younger audience. Here are some tips to get started:

Create a Business Profile

Before you can begin to market on Snapchat, you must build your profile and app presence. You can start with a business profile to enable you to run ads in the future. Your username must be unique, so you may have to add symbols or numbers to your business name. Keep in mind that you can’t change your username after you create it.

After you set up your profile, add your business logo and link the account to your business email. All you have to do is verify the email and you’re ready to go.

Build a Following

Snapchat takes time and patience to build your audience and gain followers, but it’s worth the future marketing potential. You can start with current friends on your social media accounts, which will eventually turn into new connections and followers.

Here are some tips to add Snapchat friends:

  • Use your phone contacts to gain friends quickly
  • Invite friends from your other social accounts, which can be done with your Snapcode, a scannable code that’s like a QR code.
  • Send out an email announcement for Snapchat and include exclusive content, such as product previews, that are only available on the platform.
  • Run contests to generate interest in your account, such as offers for discounts or free gifts.
  • Use the Discover section to promote short-form content and stories to your followers.
  • If you have a product or amazing content, offer early access as a giveaway. At Zutobi we like to update and launch new permit practice tests and we used Snapchat recently to give early access to the New York permit practice test.

Offer Value to Your Audience

Once you build a following, you can start creating and sharing content. Followers look for consistent, valuable content that enhances engagement, such as behind-the-scenes interviews and stories, testimonials, and feel-good content like an employee of the month or new-hire profile.

One of the most important aspects of Snapchat content is authenticity. If you have a product or service that’s really helpful for your audience you can promote it honestly with a Snapchat video. A great example of this is in how Zutobi has to balance our audience across the 50 states. Each state has different rules and tests that drivers have to learn and take before they get their license. So in order to provide the most value to our audience we have to give state specific content to our audience.

Be Different

Snapchat isn’t widely used in the marketing world. You can get in early and leverage this incredible user base to reach your audience and set yourself apart. Best of all, you don’t have to have Hollywood-quality videos – just focus on showing your real brand personality.

Don’t stress about creating perfect content right away. Snapchat gives you a chance to try new things and see what works – and what doesn’t. The content disappears, so don’t be afraid to experiment.

Leverage an Influencer Takeover

Takeovers can be intimidating, but they’re one of the best ways to get your Snapchat account on people’s radar. With a takeover, you allow an influencer to take control of your Snapchat account for one day. It’s important to trust the influencer you choose and discuss all the specifics of the plan in advance, however, to make sure that the influencer is helpful instead of damaging to your reputation.

Take Your Time

While some brands get a lot of attention seemingly overnight, that’s not a realistic expectation for Snapchat or any other platform. Snapchat can help you grow your audience and engage with your followers, but it may take some time. If you already have a following on other social media accounts, you’ll have a good start when you migrate your contacts. Just stay the course and share content consistently, and the audience will follow.

Quick Snapchat Tips

Take a look at these tips to help you maximize your time on Snapchat:

  • Keep all your content real for better brand trust and loyalty.
  • When you create your business profile, drum up excitement for Snapchat by announcing your presence on your other social media accounts.
  • Create relevant, valuable, consistent content that keeps your audience coming back for more.
  • Integrate contests and giveaways into your calendar to build awareness and interest in your brand.
  • Focus on proper storytelling with content that has a beginner, middle, and ending.
  • Bring your team in on the Snapchat marketing efforts to come up with fresh ideas and angles.
  • Use filters to customize your content with time, weather, and location details or humorous images.
  • Leverage geofilters for location-based marketing.
  • Pay attention to users with high scores, which is a way of determining how many snaps are sent and received and how popular the user is on the platform.
  • Use lenses to add variety to your snaps, such as augmented reality special effects and sound effects.
  • Stay professional, but enjoy a bit of fun and humour with Snapchat.

Add Snapchat to Your Marketing Mix

If you’re not on Snapchat yet, what are you waiting for? This fun and playful platform offers numerous opportunities for marketers to gain valuable audiences and build a brand following. Bring Snapchat into your marketing strategy to leverage this powerful resource.

Author: Tim Waldenback

Tim Waldenback is the co-founder of Zutobi Drivers Ed, a gamified e-learning platform focused on online drivers education to help teens get their license.Tim founded Zutobi to make world-class driver’s education fun, affordable, and easily accessible for all.