Snapchat: why you need to take notice

Discount the teenage kicks of Snapchat at your peril. These kids are your future consumers.

Sure, you may not want to push social, or maybe you feel it is a waste of time (see Douglas Adam’s quote on technology and age).

However, the reach of the social giant’s fleeting mechanic – digesting media that passes as quickly as it arrives – signposts the future.

The millennial audience – for want of a more accurate demographic – will only move further towards this approach in the near future. Information, news and general interaction with peers and brands will be digested on an increasingly transient basis.

Some of the biggest news and content providers (including the Daily Fail) are already posting hourly curated content in Snapchat’s Discover section, and the method has been copied on less-agile platforms.

Think also of regular content leaders LADbible and UNILAD – brands that play in the arena of disseminating interesting content, rather than being content creators. The future is in the hands of these social media ‘bouncers’ –  ‘if your name isn’t on the list, you’re not coming in’ – not Facebook gatekeepers, as some feel.

It is critical to understand the benefits of engaging with an app, especially as prospective consumers are living through the changing lenses and filters available, heralding a sea change in how brands use – and are used on – social media.

Snapchat’s personality is also a point of difference, at a time when platforms are blending into one (see Instagram Stories, Workplace by Facebook and Facebook Live).

But this isn’t all about Snapchat. It is about what it stands for, and how that appeals to the future consumer.

Those kids incessantly playing on their phones will very shortly grow up to be consumers, and you need to be thinking about targeting them today.

As an example, geo-tagging is being used across social platforms, ‘empowering’ users to share where they are and why they are there directly with their peers – for instance, at the latest sports game, restaurant opening or new sales promotion.

Understanding and appreciating generational behaviour is key to evolving any forward-thinking business’s approach. If you rest on your laurels in the fastest- changing period since the Industrial Revolution, then you will fall by the wayside.

Times are changing, and so are consumer habits – faster than you can say geo-filter.