SnapchatMany of us in the CGPR office use Snapchat on a personal level and this evolving PR tool certainly is front and center during conversation with brands trying to engage with a younger demographic under the age of 25. Here are the ten best practices if you are thinking about using Snapchat:

  1. Biggest advantage to using Snapchat: users look at it dozens of times each day
  2. Millennials are turning to online communities instead of traditional marketing as honest, dependable resources
  3. Don’t force Snapchat majority of its users are under the age of 25
  4. Snapchat is a unique platform to integrate into a companys overall marketing campaigns; it gives companies the opportunity to be spontaneous through promotions, product sneak peeks, insider information/deals and taste tests
  5. Content that performs well on Snapchat:
    • Entertainment
    • Weird Tech
    • Creativity/Arts
    • News/Events
  6. Snapchat can amplify storytelling efforts through the following ways:
    • Sets the scene for users
    • Provides creative way to share messages through the brands voice
    • Gives the option of alternating between video and images
    • Can incorporate emojis, especially the new ones just released
    • Utilizes its doodling tool for unique messaging
    • Can tell a complete story
    • Can be interactive invoking a call-to-action
  7. Snapchat Discover is a different way to explore stories and is a fast way to reach teens, but requires dedicated time and resources to make it effective
  8. When using Snapchat Discover, it is best to post content three times per week or every other day; people stop looking at content if brand/company is always at the top of the feed
  9. Creating an effective game or contest through Snapchat can be done by following these guidelines:
    • Provide clear instructions
    • Make requirements broad
    • Invite creativity let users show off their creative side
    • Short participation window (no longer than a week)
    • Sufficient staffing
    • Engage back with users send them a thank you for participating
  10. Make sure the look and feel of Snapchat is consistent across all social media platforms

Here are a couple examples of recent Snapchat campaigns that worked:

  • Hillary Clinton’s Snapchat Stories Snapchat gave Hillary Clinton a platform that allowed her to connect with a younger generation of voters and gave them the opportunity to interact with her campaign.
  • Sephora Sephora took advantage of the doodling tool and gave consumers an opportunity to interact with the retailer by taking a selfie of themselves and adding on cartoon eyebrows. By using a specific hashtag when posting the picture, they then had the opportunity to win a gift card. Not only did users post images to Snapchat, but it also turned out to be a huge success on Instagram.

To sum everything up, Snapchat is an ideal tool for brands who are targeting millennials and consumers under the age of 25, largely focusing on an age group still determining their brand loyalty. Over the next five years it will be interesting to see if an older generation takes to Snapchat, and what brands will do to accommodate and target this demographic.