What is Snapchat?

Snapchat is a mobile application that allows users to “snap” a photo or video and share it with other users. The Snapchat app was launched in 2011 by founders Evan Spiegel and Bobby Murphy. If you don’t have Snapchat yet, you can download it in your phone’s app store.

Snapchat Advertising

59% of all U.S. internet users between the ages of 13 and 24 use the Snapchat app. This means if your brand, product or service appeals to the younger demographic, particularly teenagers, then Snapchat is the right advertising platform for you. SEO Design Chicago creates Snapchat advertising campaigns for companies of all different sizes and belonging to various industries. 

Snapchat marketing is an underutilized strategy. Many other platforms often come to mind first for advertisers, like Instagram and Facebook. However, there are many benefits to using Snapchat in addition to or instead of those other social media platforms for advertising. SEO Design Chicago can help you use Snapchat to market your business to its fullest potential.

Everything You Need to Know About Snapchat Ads

Snapchat ads appear natively in the form of premium or curated content. The vertical ads fill up the phone’s entire screen, which is ideal for advertisers so viewers aren’t distracted by other content. You can create the perfect picture with Adobe Photoshop or share a logo with a transparent background. Plus, video ads are an ideal way to advertise in our mobile-centric world. Customers get to view your ad the same way they view regular snaps in their Snapchat app.

How to Use Snapchat Ads

There are a variety of ways you can use Snapchat ads. Our clients use Snapchat to: 

Drive Customers In-Store 

Many small businesses use Snapchat to help people find and share information about their business. 

Promote a New Product

You can use Snapchat to generate excitement and momentum around a new product or service launch. 

Promote a Mobile App 

Another great way to use Snapchat ads is to promote your mobile app. 

Increase Online Sales 

You can also use Snapchat to find new customers who will click through and purchase your products.

businessman happy
snapchat advertising

Why do I Need to Advertise on Snapchat

Here are the top three reasons you need to advertise on Snapchat: 

Digital Advertising is Growing 

If you are only using traditional methods of advertising, you are behind the times. Digital advertising is a growing and expanding industry that helps businesses grow every day. 

The Younger Generations Use Snapchat 

Snap ads skew to a younger demographic, though of course, people of all ages are on Snapchat. You can reach your target audience in a fun and exciting way on Snapchat, as compared to traditional marketing and advertising strategies. 

Snapchat Users are Active and Engaged

People who use Snapchat use it early and often. They are active and engaged on their mobile devices, and consuming lots of branded content. This translates to lots of conversions for the people who use Snapchat.

What is a Geofilter?

A geofilter is basically a custom filter on Snapchat. Geofilters let Snapchat users add a location illustration to their photos that they share with their friends or followers. Here’s how it works: your smartphone picks up your geographic location and serves you various geofilter options based on your location. You can set a custom Snapchat geofilter size, time and duration.

Basically, they are a type of location-based marketing that was developed by Snapchat. According to Snapchat, “geofilters are a fun way to share where you are through filter overlays. They are specific to neighborhoods and special locations.” Another kind of Snapchat filter that uses location a is community filter, which is used for landmarks, neighborhoods, and cities.

geo filters
geo filter section image

Snapchat Business Geofilters

While geofilters started out as a way for Snapchat users to share their location, like “I’m in Chicago!” with friends, due to demand, geofilters can now be utilized by businesses to market themselves and do a lot more. That’s right: you can make your very own geofilter in order to promote your business. (Or, SEO Design Chicago can design a custom Snapchat geofilter for you.)

In order to create your own geofilter for your business, you simply pay Snapchat to create your own custom geofilter in a specific area for a set amount of time. The minimum geofence area is 5,000 square feet and the minimum duration of time is 30 minutes. You might have seen these geofilters being used for someone’s wedding or at a local street festival. With such options, you can really dial in the right Snapchat geofilter specs to maximize the efficiency of your ad campaign.

How to Advertise on Snapchat

In order to set up a Snapchat advertising campaign, first you need to create an account on Snapchat Ads Manager. 

Snapchat Ad Manager

Snapchat makes it easy for you to run ads with Snapchat Ad Manager. It’s the self-serve advertising platform that lets you create ads, run campaigns, monitor performance, and optimize for your goals. On Snapchat Ad Manager, you can: 

  • Create a new campaign 
  • Choose your audience 
  • Create your ads 
  • Follow how your ads perform

How Much Does It Cost to Advertise on Snapchat? 

The Snapchat ad cost is very low. You can advertise on Snapchat for as little as $5 a day. Snapchat’s low daily minimum ad spend means you can test, learn, and optimize your ad campaigns, while staying on a minimum budget. 

young adults taking selfies

Instagram Stories Ads

Another method of advertising on Instagram is via stories. Stories are a subset of the posting options available on Instagram. User post images or short videos that stay public for 24 hours. A user can click through all of these stories moving from account they follow to account they follow with ease. Between these stories there is an opportunity for advertisers to place ads that fit into this format.

This Starburst ad is a short ad that keeps it simple. Once again it is eye catching, colorful, and clearly shows the product. In fact, aside from the tagline and call to action there isn’t anything else aside from the product. The ad is kept simple, your eye moves from top to bottom. The bold, large font of the tagline catches your eye first, than the product, and then the call to action to buy. Story ads also allow for you to have a link that users can directly click on.

Full Screen Canvas 

  • 1080 x 1920 pixels 
  • 9:16 aspect ratio 
  • Scaled proportionally to original asset 

Acceptable Creatives

  • Live, motion graphic, or stop motion video 
  • Cinemagraph 
  • Slideshow
  • Gif-life
  • Still image 

Length 

  • Between 3 and 180 seconds (as long as file size does not exceed 1 GB) 
  • 30 seconds if created in Snap Publisher 
  • If the video does exceed 30 seconds, you’ll need to use an external editing software and then upload the video to the Creative Library

File Format

  • Video: .mp4 or .mov and H.264 encoded
  • Image: .jpg or .png (png file Ads Manager only)
  • Storage Aspect Ratio (SAR): 9:16 
  • Display Aspect Ratio (DAR): 9:16 
  • Pixel Aspect Ratio (PAR): 1:1 

File Size

  • Video: 1 GB or less 
  • Image: 5 MB or less

Audio 

  • Must utilize two channels (left and right) in a balanced way throughout 
  • Audio target level should be- 16 LUFS
  • PCM or AAC codec
  • 192 minimum kbps 
  • 16 or 24 bit only

Additional Things to Know about Snapchat Ad Specs

 

How do I know if my Snapchat ad was approved?

You can check your email notifications or the Ads Manager dashboard to see your ad’s current review status. 

Why did my Snapchat ad get rejected? 

Your Snapchat ad may have been rejected for a variety of reasons. Depending on your role, you can see why your ad was rejected in the Snapchat Ads Manager. If you are having trouble creating ads that get approved by Snapchat, contact SEO Design Chicago today. 

Snapchat Tools

Snapchat offers a variety of tools to help you make the most of your snaps! You can add text to a snap, doodle on a snap, use scissors to make custom stickers, attach a link to a snap, change how long your snap plays, make video snaps loop or bounce, add voice filters, mute your audio, and even remix a snap! Of course you can always use third party software such as Adobe Photoshop. With Snapchat, the creative options are truly endless. You can really play around with your ads and have a lot of fun on Snapchat.

Snapchat Advertising Services at SEO Design Chicago

Here are just a few of the Snapchat advertising services you can get from SEO Design Chicago:

Snapchat Pixel Tracking

SEO Design Chicago will make sure the Snap Pixel has been installed on your website via the Google Tag Manager.

snapchat tools section image

Snapchat Ads Targeting

Snapchat has excellent targeting capabilities in the USA so you can make sure you are getting your ad in front of your custom audiences. SEO Design Chicago will target your Snapchat ads for you to make sure they are effective.

Strategy and Planning

SEO Design Chicago develops a customized digital advertising strategy for your company that incorporates your content. We will make sure that your brand is the right fit for a Snapchat advertising strategy.

Launching Snapchat Ads

Finally, we will launch your ads! We handle each stage of the sales funnel, so you don’t have to.

START ADVERTISING ON SNAPCHAT

SEO Design Chicago is a professional Snapchat advertising agency. Contact SEO Design Chicago to get started with Snapchat advertising and marketing for your company or brand. If you need help managing your social media accounts like Snapchat, we also offer social media management services to help you gain more followers on Snapchat and other platforms!

Contact SEO Design Chicago