How to Create a Campaign on Snapchat

When it comes to social media campaigns, marketers are quick to turn to Facebook and Instagram. However, trends indicate that other social media platforms and messaging apps are gaining popularity as advertising sources. Snapchat ranks as one of the top performing platforms, with improved features geared towards businesses to make the creation of campaigns easy and effective.

Snapchat Stats

Snapchat is a messaging app as much as it is a social media app, allowing the content it hosts to remain more private than other social network accounts. In some respects, it sits in the league of other messaging apps including Skype, WhatsApp, WeChat and Facebook Messenger. People can share content with their friends either publicly (for 24 hours) or privately. On the ‘Discovery’ feature of the app, users can view a number of newsfeed Stories by partners and publishers.

Here are the key statistics that make this a great avenue for your business’s digital marketing campaigns:

• Snapchat continues to grow at a rate of 14% per year
• Snapchat users spend an average of 30 minutes, with 46% visiting the app several times per day
• There are 238 million users worldwide who are active on a daily basis
• There are 2.9 million Snapchat users in the UAE alone

Based on the above, it is clear to see that Snapchat holds a lot of potential for advertising, as its app engagement is high. In comparison to other social media, it comes in ahead of Instagram and second only to Facebook. 

How to Create Snapchat Marketing / Advertising Campaigns

Snapchat allows users to create various ads at an either ‘Instant’ or ‘Advanced’ level. Instant Create is for a single image or video ad with creative assets that the tool will auto-extract from your website in seconds. For all other types of ads that fall into ad sets with more control over the objectives targeting, select Advanced Create.

From the Snap Ad Manager, you can create, track and optimise advertising campaigns easily. It is a completely self-serviced advertising manager that can work for various businesses of all sizes and budgets. When designing your campaign, these are the kinds of data you should keep in mind:

• The pertinent details: Snapchat Ads will ask you for a headline and call to action which will be featured and visible on the ad.
• Asset management: You can create and manage ads from the Creative Library, where you’ll be able to download all of your assets created on the app. Using the Snap Publisher tool, you can create and edit images and videos seamlessly.
• Targeting considerations: You will be able to target people based on the placement of your ad, demographics including gender, age (aim for 29 and younger), language and lifestyle (targeting specific interests). This can be selected automatically or manually to detailed and customised audiences.
• Cost: When it comes to budget, you can work with various figures that will get you different kinds of ads and reach. The minimum daily budget you need is $5 or 18 AED. This can be calculated on a ‘per goal’ or ‘per thousand impressions’ basis.
• Interest: To peak the interest of the viewer, increase your reach and generate high quality leads, consider the platform carefully. You need to ensure that your ad fits in with the style and kind of content so that it is relevant to the audience.
• Goals: Due to the nature of the ads on Snapchat, you can easily direct people to where you want them to go. Keep that in mind when setting your campaign goals. You can increase your website visits, app instals, share longform videos, re-engage people or grow awareness. Snapchat ads have a 3% swipe up rate and 8.5% conversion rate.
• Snap Pixel - Tracking: This is a great feature for analytics as it allows you to see the journey your customers take. You can track how Snapchat advertising affects your business when selling targeted, direct response goods or services.

Create a campaign

To create a campaign, simply head over to Snapchat’s website. From there you will be guided through the following steps:

• Sign in to your account (or create on if you don’t have one)
• Create a business account in Settings
• Include your payment information (for future ads)
• At the Dashboard of Ad Manager, you select ‘create your campaign’ and opt between ‘Instant’ or ‘Advanced’
• Set up your ad and ‘Build Ad Sets’ (this includes targeting information and the format)
• Build your ad (with the content)
• Publish your ad
• Track the metrics from the Ad Manager

Types of Snapchat Ads

Snap Ads: These are full screen vertical ads that can be in the form of a single image or video. They are slotted between other Story content on the app and call for immediate action. They can be anything from a few seconds to a few minutes long and are a great option for small businesses.

Story Ads: A series of 3-20 Snaps that feature alongside popular content in the Discovery section. This is tailored to the preferences of users.

Filters: These are stylized texts and illustrated overlays that are options to include in a Snap when a user is taking a photo or video. These are targeted at specific demographics or can be Geo Filters, where the filter is applicable to a certain location.

Lenses: These are augmented reality lenses that people can use when the camera detes their face, or a surrounding with World Lenses. It brings an imagined life to your own virtual reality and allows the user to interact with your lens.

Commercials: These ads feature among Snapchat's Curated Content and have limited availability at the moment. They are video ads that cannot be skipped for six seconds to drive brand awareness.

Collection Ads: These ads are viewable in Stories and showcase a series of products with tappable browsing.

Dynamic Ads: These are automated and targeted directly to specific people who have viewed your site or app. The ads are built directly from your product catalogue, featuring relevant products to the Snapchatter.

Snapchat is one of the world’s primary messaging apps which can provide your business with great advertising potential. With their high engagement rates among their audience, this is definitely a platform for your campaigns. Campaign creation is easy - get started with yours today.

If you need help creating your Snapchat campaign, speak to us at Nexa.