Business in a snap:
The photo-sharing app Snapchat has become wildly popular, mainly among two audiences: sexting enthusiasts and teens sharing “I-just-woke-up-with-ugly-hair” photos. But recently, the app has caught the attention of another group of people: businesses and political campaigners.
Founded by 23-year-old Evan Spiegal, Snapchat is an app that allows the user to send a photo or video to other Snapchat users for a designated amount of time. The viewer can see the “snap” for one to 10 seconds, depending on the sender’s settings, before it is hidden from them and permanently deleted.
But the future of Snapchat may be more than just a way to share photos between friends. Businesses and political campaigners are beginning to see Snapchat as a potential marketing tool, said Josh Light, CEO and co-founder of PoliticIt.
“I believe that companies in the future will use Snapchat to offer secret sales deals,” he said. “Restaurants will use it to offer secret menu items and we’ll also see it being used to build anticipation for new products.”
Light graduated from USU in 2010 and went on to form PoliticIt, a website meant to assess the “digital influence” a politician has in order to predict their campaign’s success. “Digital influence” includes Facebook, Twitter, Google searching trends and news stories, among other things, said PoliticIt investor and USU professor John D. Johnson.
According to Light, Snapchat will soon join these platforms as a campaigning tool.
“Snapchat should be used by candidates to make themselves more personal and real for their closest fans and volunteers,” Light said. “By taking pictures or videos of your moments that people don’t normally see, you’ll come off as more of a personal candidate.”
Some businesses are already using Snapchat as a marketing tool. Taco Bell used Snapchat to introduce its “Beefy Crunch Burrito.” It tweeted for people to add Taco Bell on Snapchat, and the next day it sent the “secret announcement” of its new product to all of its followers.
The frozen yogurt company 16 Handles used Snapchat to give away coupons. Everyone who Snapchatted a picture of themselves eating the frozen yogurt received a coupon ranging from 16 percent to 100 percent off their next purchase; the coupon came as a “snap.” The 10-second time limit meant the customer couldn’t open the snap until he or she was ready to buy his or her yogurt.
“The reason it was so genius is the customer had no idea what their discount was going to be until they had already made the decision to buy the yogurt and were in front of the register,” Light said. “On top of that, 16 Handles received a plethora of images from their customers that they could use in their marketing campaigns, and they got a massive amount of press as well.”
Carrisa Dominy, marketing manager for USU’s Campus Store, said she hadn’t considered using Snapchat as a marketing tool until recently.
“I’ve never thought about it before because it seems like a personal thing, but marketing should be personal,” she said. “There definitely is potential with it. It’s just something that’s new, which is totally fine.”
Dominy said the Campus Store might have sales exclusively for Snapchat users.
“We’d advertise, ‘Snapchat us and we’ll Snapchat you back a percentage off, but don’t open it until you get to the register,'” she said.
Dominy said the Campus Store could send advertisements via Snapchat, which would be different from the usual display signs they put up around campus. She said the time limit placed on snaps would help guarantee student’s full attention.
“That’s kind of where technology is going,” she said. “You don’t have 30 seconds of people’s time necessarily.”
Rachel Lankford, social media specialist for the Campus Store, said they would need to be careful not to overuse the app if they used it as a marketing strategy.
“It’s always good to try out new tactics, but it could be used as a disadvantage,” she said. “People might get annoyed, or it could be less of a personal touch and more invasive.”
According to a study by Ipsos Open Thinking Exchange, Americans who use social media spend an average of 3.2 hours per day doing so. Dominy said she expects social media use to grow even more in the future, so she realizes it’s crucial to include it in the Campus Store’s marketing strategy.
“Social media is huge for marketing,” she said. “Pretty soon, I feel like it’ll be more important than paper or any physical advertisement you could do. Social media is that much more important and that much more effective, and that includes Snapchat.”
– sarah.men@aggiemail.usu.edu