The Inside Story: How Snapchat Can Increase Member Engagement
Event Marketing | Content, Social & Digital Marketing | best practices | member engagement | association | content marketing
With 4 to 6 billion video views a day, Snapchat is shoring up to be the fastest growing social media network in the world. A hot topic and popular session at ASAE's Marketing, Membership and Communication Conference, lead by Nicholas Mattar, Director of Marketing at the Detroit Regional Chamber discussed this very fact. Mattar walked attendees through a fun and interactive learning lab session on Snapchat, offering a tutorial for new users, and discussing best practices. By integrating Snapchat into your organizations larger social media strategy, Mattar articulates that you will be able to increase brand awareness while also showing tangible revenue on investment to stakeholders.
Since its launch in 2011 by co-founders Evan Spiegel and Bobby Murphy, Snapchat has made some major developments and achievements. Originally designed as an app to share photos that would eventually disappear, Snapchat has rebranded itself time and time again to include new features such as video capabilities, stories, filters, stickers, advertisements, tap-to-view, lenses, memories, short-form content, chat messenger, live video chat, geofilters, and more! It is safe to say that Snapchat will continue to evolve, as advertisers are spending more money on social media advertising than on TV ads, innovating new ways to serve ads to users.
The Basics
The basics of Snapchat are rather simple – users can send a photo, video, and text to friends that disappear after several seconds, either one-on-one or in a group setting. In addition to the basic photo and message exchanges, stories, memories, and stickers are three commonly used features on the app. Stories are photos or video messages that can be re-watched for 24 hours before disappearing while memories are saved and stored for later. Stickers are often used on stories and messages, allowing the user to be creative and embellish their snaps.
Why Organizations Should Start Snapping
Not only is Snapchat continuing to evolve its own features, it is increasing engagement for large audiences worldwide.
“Recent statistics show that more than 60 percent of 13-to-34-year-old smartphone users in the U.S. are Snapchatters and that there are 8 billion-plus video views on Snapchat daily. Metrics company comScore says Snapchat reaches 11 percent of the entire U.S. digital population, while Business Insider reports that Snapchat users send 700 million photos and videos each day.”
According to Samantha Whitehorne, editorial director of ASAE’s Associations Now, Snapchat gives audiences more content, generates more buzz around events, and most importantly:
- It’s where a lot of your attendees are.
- It gives users a behind-the-scenes look at your events.
- It creates a sense of urgency and exclusivity.
If you are an organization catering your marketing efforts to students and early career professionals, Snapchat can help you communicate with your audience and increase engagement. Have you started to incorporate Snapchat into your events? Research says only 3 percent of organizations use Snapchat to promote events. Download the app to see what Snapchat can do for you and your organization today!
*Information courtesy of "It's a Snap: Adding Snapchat To Your Event's Engagement Strategy"and "A Brief History of Snapchat"