Every second, 8,796 photos are shared on Snapchat.
With 100 million daily users, and constant updates and new features, Snapchat is an important social media platform that, surprisingly, few brands have yet figured out how to master.
It may sound like a scary unknown world, but with few brands utilizing Snapchat effectively, there is room for brands to capitalize on the app.
According to Cewe Photoworld, more photos are shared on Snapchat in a second than any other social network. In just 30 seconds, more than 250,000 photos are shared on the app.
So Snapchat is obviously a viable platform that few brands are on. But what do we know about the few brands that have found success from the app early on?
Two case studies worth exploring come from two food and beverage brands that are already making effective use of the app’s most fun features.
The Unmatched Success of the Taco Head
In honor of Cinco de Mayo this year, Taco Bell partnered with Snapchat to create a sponsored Lens campaign that turned users’ heads into a giant taco shell:
The Lens took a total of six weeks to develop, and although it was only live for one day, Snapchat reported the taco shell was the most viewed Snapchat Lens to date, receiving 224 million views in the 24 hours it was available. When adding together the amount of time unique users interacted with the ad, the campaign generated 12.5 years worth of play in just one day.
For holidays and big ticket events, these campaigns can cost up to $750,000, but with results like this, big brands that have the budget for it must start utilizing this platform to reach their market, especially if millennials (the app’s largest user base) are anywhere within their target demographic (AdWeek).
Many brands may argue that it’s difficult to measure ROI or conversion rates with Snapchat, but 224 million eyes on one brand’s message in a day certainly seems worth the investment.
The Wheaties Box for a New Generation
Another brand making a splash in Snapchat’s space is Sprite. Earlier this year, Sprite launched a campaign in Brazil called “RFRSH Na Lata,” (“Refresh the Can”), in which Brazilian Snapchat influencers’ Snapcodes were printed on a series of Sprite cans. In just two weeks after the campaign launch, many of the influencers tripled their following as a result.
So what’s in it for the consumer? Along with the rollout of the influencer cans, Sprite developed a microsite where fans can register their Snapcode for a chance to have their own code printed on the next series of cans. Offering Snapchat users a chance to appear on the company’s soda cans is a huge deal for anyone with a public Snapchat account. As with any social media platform, the amount of followers (or in Snapchat’s case, viewers), a user has, the more popular they become in the social media sphere. It’s no secret that social media is often one big popularity contest, so this is incentive enough for fans to enter their code for a chance to appear on cans that will be distributed throughout the country.
Convince and Convert put it best when they compared printing a Snapcode on a product to printing athletes on Wheaties boxes. Perhaps the Sprite Snapcode can will be the Wheaties box for Gen Y.
Although it’s too early to tell the final results of this campaign (users have until December 3 to enter), the campaign garnered 2 million views in just two days after its launch.
Recent studies in purchasing behavior have shown that millennials prefer a brand with a compelling story to one they know little about. Considering the success of these two campaigns just goes to show the true power of Snapchat’s visual storytelling.
