Snapchat has launched its first-ever Sponsored Snap, promoting Universal Pictures’ upcoming movie Wicked. The 10-second video includes a direct link to the movie’s official website, and appears in a user’s inbox without a push notification whenever they happen to be looking at their DMs – deleting itself if the user never engages with the sponsored snap.
Snapchat describes Sponsored Snaps as a natural extension of how users interact with businesses on the platform. With over 101 million daily active users in North America, Snapchat offers brands a broad reach, especially among younger demographics. Notably, more than half of U.S. Snapchat users are aged 25 and older, expanding the app’s appeal beyond ****s, which may be part of the reason that the first Sponsored Snap is a suitable-for-all-ages musical like Wicked.
According to Snapchat, its users are avid moviegoers. A Kantar study found that 92% of weekly Snapchat users attend the theater, and 75% enjoy movies with others. Snapchatters are also 1.7 times more likely to see a movie on its premiere weekend compared to non-users, making the platform a strategic choice for promoting Wicked. By placing the sponsored content directly in DMs, there’s also a chance that it will prompt users to bring it up during conversations – for example, if two users are trying to find something to do with a free night.
Sponsored Snaps were originally pitched back in September as a way to bring ads directly to the platform’s messaging system, which was many user’s primary way of using Snapchat as a whole. While this Wicked advertisement is a clever use of the idea, it’s also the first iteration of something that could become a much more complex – and effective – marketing tool if the Sponsored Snap concept continues to be tweaked and refined.
