Snapchat is a social media platform that was introduced to the market in 2011, but really started to take off in 2014, and now has 150 million daily active users. Snapchat is a downloadable app that offers a new and interesting alternative way for people to communicate visually with one another via photographs and video, which can be edited before sharing with other users of the app. The key difference to other channels, such as Facebook and Twitter, is that these visual updates only appear on the screen for a short amount of time; 10 seconds in fact. It may sound simple, but it is extremely effective.
There are over 14 million Snapchat users in the UK, which accounts for 75% of mobile messaging data traffic in UK. Many of these users are under 34, which is an active market for B2B marketers that may be promoting health apps.
How can Snapchat benefit healthcare marketing?
Marketers know that using visual media is effective; 40% of us respond better to a picture rather than written text. This is why so much social media marketing includes a variety of content such as photos and videos.
With this in mind, using more visually-oriented social media channels such as Pinterest and Snapchat can make sense, especially if the subject matter lends itself to the channel.
Snapchat helps you to boost your brand awareness by humanising your company which is achieved through creating visual stories for people to associate you with.
Take events, for example. These are an effective way for your target audiences to learn more about your business, products and services. Many B2B marketers often use Twitter to post images from an event, but Snapchat may be a more suitable medium if you want to use more photos and videos.
Snapchat can help create awareness of the event that you are attending or running, as it is a good way to encourage engagement as application users gain a visual insight into what the show is like, the atmosphere, and the types of people attending.
Although this too can be achieved through channels such as Twitter, the advantage of Snapchat is that it provides the ability to access a different audience, which can increase the number of prospects becoming aware of your organisation. This is especially relevant if you want to engage with the younger audiences active on Snapchat.
Ideas for using Snapchat
Snapchat could be used at a range of healthcare events. For example, at a conference, you could show that you are exhibiting, where you are located on the floorplan, who is available to meet and any speaking sessions being hosted or you are presenting at. You can also use it at social events such as dinners and healthcare award ceremonies, where you can celebrate other healthcare organisations and professionals’ success via, for example, posting short 10 second videos highlighting their achievements.
More and more people are beginning to own smartphones, providing them with the ability to capture and share the visual media that Snapchat thrives on. This means there are increasing numbers of potential Snapchat users in the growing healthcare social media market.
However, you must consider that Snapchat is still a fairly new network, meaning that Snapchat users may not actually know that your company is active on the app. This means it is important to cross promote your Snapchat via other social media platforms, such as Twitter and Facebook.
How are B2B marketers using Snapchat?
Currently there are fewer B2B companies on Snapchat in comparison to B2C. Famous brands include McDonalds, Mercedes Benz, Live Nation, Evian and ASOS. In the B2B field, DocuSign shared their ‘Dreamforce conference’ via Snapchat and gained 20,000 views overnight.
With relatively few using Snapchat for B2B marketing, this provides a good opportunity to lead the way in the use of the application. It can help both with marketing and recruitment by giving viewers an insight into your company and culture. It can be used to be informative and educational, which can allow people to form a relationship with your company or organisation.
How does Snapchat measure up?
To help measure performance, Snapchat offer an analytics service which allows you to keep a close eye on exactly how much engagement you are receiving in terms of followers and views. This will allow you to determine whether you are, or are not gaining the full benefits out of the platform.
As with any social media (or healthcare marketing) activity, the key is to determine your objectives and then look at the best tactics to achieve those objectives. If you are looking to present a time-limited visual story of your brand to a growing, younger audience, then Snapchat could provide you with the right channel.
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