Do you know how Snapchat works? Roughly, Snapchat is an application for sharing photos and videos between friends. The difference between this tool and its competitors is that its contents are automatically deleted from both the sender’s and recipient’s devices, seconds after being sent. That is, you can send photos and videos of up to 10 seconds to your friends that will be deleted once viewed and never recovered.
The original idea of Snapchat was to allow close friends to share content with each other. In fact, the application works well for this audience and has been growing exponentially throughout the world. This growth caused companies to start paying attention to Snapchat as an alternative way of online marketing.
Facts about Snapchat
We extracted some interesting facts from one about this social network to better understand the panorama:
- 70% of Snapchat’s audience are women.
- 18% of people who have an iPhone use Snapchat.
- The majority of Snapchat’s audience is between the ages of 13 and 25.
- Users of this social network send, on average, 400 million ‘snaps’ (photos and videos sent by the application) per day.
Tips on how to use Snapchat in your virtual store
1. Use other social networks to promote your account
To conquer your first followers on Snapchat, you will have to appeal to the other social networks where you already have a presence. For example: If you have a good fan base on Facebook, advertise that you have an account on this new social network so that your existing followers become your followers on Snapchat.
2. Create photos and videos showing previews of new products
If you are launching a new product, how about using Snapchat to preview it to your customers? Since the content will be removed once viewed, you can display details to leave your followers curious. You can select the period you want your image or video to last (from 1 to 10 seconds per ‘snap’).
3. Offer discount coupons
One of the most popular strategies e-commerce on Snapchat is to offer discount coupons. Create an image of the coupon and send it to your fan base. Remember that it must be objective and direct to the point, since people will only be able to visualize it for 10 seconds.
4. Enable the ‘Replay’ feature
By enabling this option, you will allow your followers to see your ‘snap’ for only a second time. You configure it from ‘Settings’, ‘Repetition’, like this:
In addition to ‘Replay’, you can activate other features:
- Filters: They work similarly to Instagram filters and allow you to change the appearance of your photos (for example from color to black and white).
- front flash: As the name says, it allows you to take a photo with the front camera of your cell phone to come out with a flash.
- Energy save mode: so that the application consumes less battery.
- Number of best friends: these are the people who interact with you the most on Snapchat and appear next to your profile. You can configure how many appear.
5. Use the ‘My Story’ functionality
Through the ‘My story’ function you will be able to share a series of photos or videos with all your clients at once. That content will be available to your followers an unlimited number of times for 24 hours. With this resource you will be able to share behind the scenes of the day to day of your online store. For example, you can take photos of your staff preparing orders. See how you can add a photo to ‘My Story’:
You will need to click on the icon at the bottom of the screen and select ‘Add’ in the pop-up window that will appear. That way, your story will automatically be available to all your contacts. If you would like to block some contacts from getting your story, you can! Look how:
Go to ‘Settings’, ‘View My Story’, select ‘Custom’ mode, and click on the users you want NOT to be able to see your story. Clever! Pretty simple right?
Other strategies
Here are other strategies you can try with Snapchat:
- Make your followers interact with you: for example, you can send a ‘snap’ to your base saying that the first to respond will win a special discount on some product.
- Treasure hunt: you can photograph an object or place and challenge your followers to ‘snap’ you back with the same object/place. As you receive the answers, you release the next image for those who got it right. In this case, whoever completes the list of photos first wins; and obviously you give him a prize (it can be one of your products, or a discount).
- Explore the everyday: One of the things that people most like to see from brands on social media is ‘behind the scenes’. Send photos that no one would see if it wasn’t for following you on Snapchat. Take advantage of the fact that the contents will self-destruct in 10 seconds!
- Introduce your team members: The human being is curious and likes to know. In addition, this will generate empathy with the user.
It is understood?
Today’s tip was less fast than usual, but we hope you liked it. Remember that Snapchat is just beginning to gain popularity and therefore we recommend that you invest in this social network once you have exhausted your other possibilities, or if you have a target audience between 13 and 25 years old. If you are not in this situation but you know someone who is, share this article with them :).
Finally, if you still do not sell online and would like to do so, . It’s simple, fast, free and you don’t need any technical knowledge 🙂
Luck!
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