Snapchat for Events: Why It’s Time for Corporate Planners to Start Using the Platform

Each year as a corporate event planner I like to take some time to kickback and think about what I believe could be the next big event trend.

And do you know what? I think it could be Snapchat.  I truly believe the tipping point on Snapchat for #EventProfs has come. Snapchat has been seen as the social media for kids because of the rapid early adoption rate for teens. Of course teens embraced it, the app seems uniquely built for them. While photo and video sharing apps like Instagram have grown quickly in user base and influence, it hasn’t really caught on as a messenger platform and that’s what teens have been addicted to since ICQ and MSN a generation before.

Living in the now and not dwelling on the past is a user behavior of teenagers and a fundamental of Snapchat. If you ask anyone about the app they will say, “Isn’t that the one where your posts go away after 24 hours?” They’re right. That was the single biggest turn off to marketers and it’s what kept the platform pure and let it grow organically for the first few years of its existence.

Snaps are temporary but, really, aren’t most social media posts? Sure you can shop someone or stalk them to get their history (trust me, I do it more than most) but for the most part what we post on Facebook or Instagram shows up in our followers feeds and is never see it again. Radio and television ads came and went for years and marketers didn’t struggle with their content disappearing. This is nothing new. Snapchat just formalizes the disposability of social media communications.  It also does one better, it uses FOMO to create an addiction.

FOMO (fear of missing out) is a powerful tactic because it’s more and more difficult to get action from people with an increase of calls to action happening in the form of constant advertising. Online ad-blocking technology, Netflix, and streaming music have conditioned consumers to recoil at the very idea of advertising. When you combine that with every brand adopting content marketing and becoming “storytellers” and too many social media channels to keep up with you get a cynical, overly-savvy consumer who just doesn’t care about images from your recent event. Having a platform that pushes people to watch the content they initially signed up for or forever losing the chance to see it has made Snapchat second only to Facebook in average time spent on the platform by users.

What excites me as an event professional is exactly that… they are a platform of the temporary. It’s where this app and we in the meetings and events industry can relate uniquely. Our events, as exciting, creative, and impactful as they can be, are here one day and gone the next. Temporary experiences are our trademark and there is finally a communications platform as committed to this idea as we are.

When I told you that Snapchat was a difficult place for marketers to adopt I didn’t say impossible. As the platform has changed over the past few years, it’s become more and more geared towards gaining revenue (saying no to Facebook’s offer of 3 Billion dollars to buy them must be part of it).

As a closed platform, Snapchat’s ability to gain revenue from brands comes in the form of photo and video filters. Filters are ways to enhance photos similar to what Instagram allows you to do by overlaying different colors, lighting, and effects over images and videos. Unlike Instagram, creative images can be added to Snaps to give context and those are now branded.

It doesn’t stop there. Another big trend in 2017 is obviously Virtual reality and augmented reality. Agencies have become more interested in interactive technologies which has seen Snapchat starting to explore how virtual reality can be integrated with physical experience.

The hype around Pokémon Go – this physical, real-world game powered by a traditionally one-to-one mobile app, has demonstrated consumers’ thirst for blended experiences with 75m downloads worldwide. VR and AR will allow us to engage in new experiences and interact with alternative realities no matter where we are. Snapchat may have only just started their journey into virtual experiences but it’s certainly one to watch!

Reported by:  SocialTables.com