Articles and online courses can only get you so far when it comes to understanding how to best work with digital ads. And even after years of working in Facebook, Instagram, Google, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and Snapchat ads, we’re still learning new things about their respective platforms every day. Particularly on Snapchat, where we find fewer brands are looking at ads in favor of Facebook and Instagram, there is a lot of misinformation spread online.
We’ll be addressing some of this misinformation so you can better understand Snapchat ads, and give you real facts firsthand from an agency’s experience. Our sources in this article are either directly from Snapchat and their account managers themselves, or from our own background.
Here are 3 myths that we will be debunking, followed by 3 tips to make the most out of the platform!
Myth 1: Instagram Killed Snapchat
Ever since Instagram introduced Stories back in 2016, the social media world wrote Snapchat off as a dead man walking. Year after year, time and time again. Despite this, four years later Snapchat still thrives: according to Snapchat, its app reaches 90% of mobile consumers in the U.S. between 13 and 24 (as of 2019). Additionally, 38% of Snapchatters don’t use Instagram, and 49% of Snapchatters don’t use Facebook (as of 2019). All this considered, you can reach a decent-sized audience on Snapchat with ads that will be exclusive to that app.
Myth 2: Snapchat Requires a Minimum Ad Spend of $3,000
This statistic has been floating around different articles on the internet for a while, and has actually been unknowingly gatekeeping people from experimenting with Snapchat ads. However, this stat is incorrect: regular ads via the ads manager do not have a minimum ad spend, though best practice dictates that your ad sets should each be spending at least $5 per day. That said, you can rest assured that you can freely customize ad spend based on your own budget, and don’t have to worry about spending a minimum amount.
Myth 3: Facebook and Instagram Ads are Just Better in Every Way
Let’s make something clear: we’re not saying that Snapchat ads necessarily beat out Facebook and Instagram ads (which we refer to interchangeably here, as they are both managed via the Facebook Business Manager). But to claim that Facebook and Instagram ads are unequivocally superior is misinformed. In fact, Snapchat has some different targeting options, and unlike Facebook Business Manager, Snapchat gives advertisers access to unique audience data such as household income and number of kids. Additionally, we have personally found Snapchat’s business support system to be far superior and more responsive than Facebook’s system. Snapchat also offers much more visually appealing and customizable templates in an easy-to-use ad creation platform. Marketers who claim that Facebook and Instagram are superior in every way are doing a disservice to themselves by willfully ignoring the unique strengths of other platforms.
Tip 1: Low Marketing Budget? Repurpose Your Content
There are minor differences between the ad specifications for Snapchat ads and Facebook’s Story ads, so if you’re already creating content for one platform, you can easily repurpose it for the other. No need to have a unique photoshoot for each platform if you’re targeting a similar audience on all of them! This will help you save time, money, and effort, while still ensuring that you’re effectively creating visually appealing Snapchat ads.
Tip 2: Save the In-Depth A/B Testing for Facebook and Instagram
Facebook Business Manager makes it simple to duplicate ad sets and make frequent changes or bulk edits, which makes it the optimal platform for running in-depth audience tests. While Snapchat does allow you to duplicate ad sets, we find the Facebook platform to be better-suited for extensive testing of different audience groups. So save yourself some time, and don’t worry too much about in-depth testing for Snapchat when you can rely on Facebook and Instagram to do so.
Tip 3: Have Different Creative Versions Ready to Go
Ad fatigue is higher on Snapchat than on Facebook or Instagram, meaning that consumers are more likely to see the same ads repeatedly, and as a result become less responsive to them. Unlike Facebook and Instagram, where fewer ads can sometimes be better because they can garner more engagements over time and snowball into better results, Snapchat has no such system. Our advice is to create more than one version of every ad, and to take advantage of Snapchat’s ad creation platform to quickly modify ready-made templates using your own original images.
Conclusion
Ultimately, there are plenty of ways to productively use Snapchat ads. With its high audience reach, unique targeting options, and great ad creation tools, it is indeed a reliable platform that will help develop your brand.
At the end of the day, we hope this has been a lesson in trusting experience rather than anecdotal evidence or third-party sources. We also hope this has been useful in learning more about Snapchat ads and how they can help grow your business.
Of course, we’re always happy to help, too! Get in touch with us today if you’re looking for an advertising agency committed to driving real business results.