So, I think everyone’s heard of Snapchat, right? We’ll go into more detail below, but Snapchat is famous for being the go to place to post snippets of your life that magically disappear in anywhere from 1-10 seconds, depending on what the user decides. Snapchat could be such an incredible asset for businesses, if only they understood how to use it to fit their needs.

Keep reading to find out how Snapchat can turn your company from a start up to a household name.

What Is Snapchat?

Created in 2011, Snapchat is a mobile app available for Apple and Android devices that lets you capture either a still photo or video that will self destruct in 1-10 seconds. You read right! Snapchat’s photos permanently delete after the time limit set by the user, unless posted to the user’s Story. The Snapchat Story is a little library of a user’s Snapchats, over the period of 24 hours, that they have chosen to upload for everyone to see and watch as many times as they’d like. And, like the Snaps you can send to individuals, your Story permanently deletes 24 hours after your upload it. Snapchat is a great way to capture bursts of life and share them with viewers in a way that says “fun” and “quick”, rather than a platform like Instagram, where users can write obscenely long captions to accompany their photos.

The obsession with Snapchat came about because of the ease of use for both the user and the viewer. As previously mentioned above, Snapchat is more carefree and easy to use, simply because of the fact that you can see things in sequence when media is posted to a user’s Story, which gives viewers the ability to understand what’s happening and follow along.

How Can My Business Utilize Snapchat?

Snapchat poses an excellent opportunity for businesses to showcase their company culture, introduce new products, share helpful tips, show “behind the scenes” content and interact with brand advocates and customers. With the use of filters, businesses can show off their inner kid by choosing something crazy like the infamous faceswap feature, or go with something much more work-appropriate, such as the dog-ears and slurping tongue face overlay (yes, that was sarcastic). With the increased use of social media in recent years, people have become accustom to seeing what people and companies are like in everyday life. Sure, they care about the company and what it does or stands for, but what they really want to see what life is like when you work for the company. This is where things like vlogs come into play. Vlogging, most popular on YouTube, gives viewers a behind the scenes look at what that YouTuber does during their everyday life. With Snapchat, you can avoid the intense editing that comes with long videos by posting photos and short behind the scenes videos onto your Snapchat Story. This level of authentic openness will give viewers insight into who you are as a company and will make them more likely to purchase a product/service from you verses one of your competitors that they can’t connect with, due to the lack of accessibility or relatable content they receive from that company’s social media.

Snapchat could be especially useful for companies who are looking to draw the attention of those who have just graduated from high school or college for possible hiring, seeing as companies are now looking to Snapchat for job applications (you can read about that here).

Snapchat can be utilized as an asset to those in a variety of professions. Take, for instance, a restaurant owner:

Phil owns a restaurant and he’s looking to draw the attention of more people in a new and fun way. Phil turns to Snapchat and decides to start videoing and photographing the cooking staff preparing and serving the meals. Not only are his Snaps visually appealing, but it shows the quality and assortment of food that Phil and his staff allow in their kitchen and showcases the freshness and superiority of his food’s ingredients. Phil also decides to give the company Snapchat over to Ralph, his most personable host, and asks him to go around the restaurant and interact with some of the customers on video. This showcases the restaurant’s company culture and gives viewers an opportunity to see the care and hospitality each guest receives and can expect when visiting Phil’s restaurant.

In conclusion, Snapchat is one of the best ways to connect with consumers, showcase company culture, share your expertise in your field and secure the likelihood that those who view your Snaps will purchase a product/service from you over your competitor who isn’t utilizing social media in the same way.