Influence: At the beginning of our Social Media Theory & Practice course, I had 1,130 followers on Twitter. I thought this to be a decent amount, although I’d had the account and used it on and off since 2009, meaning I’d only gained a rough average of around 141 followers per year. In the three […]

How are modern social media impacting your relationships? Social media allows me to extend my relationships beyond those in my immediate contact area or beyond people or are within close proximity to me on a daily basis. For example, I was studying abroad last semester in France and I befriended some international college students while […] What makes a good story you ask?  A good story is made up of pictures, it’s made up of seconds and it’s made up of friends.  The story I am conveying is none other, but the Snapchat story. The Snapchat headache. 4 ways to stay sane while snapping your life away: http://t.co/vJXKmRSg70 pic.twitter.com/lRDLFR59Gd

— Elite Daily (@EliteDaily) October 5, 2015

Snapchat is one of my favorite mediums to tell a story, but it needs to have a few concrete requirements in order to be exciting.

By following these three things, Snapstories are more enjoyable.  Having it less than 70 seconds allows a viewer to stay interested. Even though Snapchat stories can be fast-forwarded, it is best to make sure that your viewer doesn’t get bored.  By having a funny or exciting Snapstory with people other than yourself, your content will not be fast-forwarded.  It’s one thing to have a Snapchat story, its another thing to have a story that gets talked about.

The first three things are necessary for an interesting Snap story, but it is important to make sure you don’t include the following things since they are common mistakes people make.  So don’t include:

Snapchat Stories should include:

By doing these things, it will makes sure that your story is entertaining and ready to be watched.  I am not a fan of seeing weather posts, we all go to Syracuse and signed up for 30 degree weather, it isn’t necessary to make an entire Snapchat story dedicated to it. These are just a few things to make this creative medium more entertaining and worthwhile.

At the end of the day, using these ideas of a Snapchat story are relate-able to any type of story. As the creator of content, you want to make sure that the content short and to the point.  While it can be longer if necessary, it needs to be done once in a blue moon – you don’t want to be known as the person who has a 120 second Snapchat stories.  You also need to make sure that the content needs to be relate-able in some way, or outrageous.  By doing this, a person will be engaged in what was going on and will continue to read or watch the story.  Using Snapchat stories also reminds you that you can’t be selfish all the time. While a Snapchat story is about your life, you need to remember that being relate-able will keep a story alive.

Social media is a wonder of the modern world. Okay, maybe not “social media” as it is defined (since it has been around a long time), but social media as we know it. I mean just think, Twitter and Facebook alone allow us to connect to people all over the globe in a matter of […]

As society has advanced, we have become incredibly technological, and our awareness and interaction revolves around the many social media platforms that we use. These changes have led advertisers to modify the way in which they get their message out to the public, as they have had to learn to engage us in new ways […]

Recently, The Worldwide Wildlife Fund embraced the increasing popularity of Snapchat through their #LastSelfie campaign. The social media campaign was aimed to bring attention to the rapid depletion of endangered species like tigers, rhinos, gorillas, and more. The WWF wanted to engage Millenials in the conversation of endangered species by bringing the issue to a platform […]

Marketing and advertising have always been dependent on consumers’ attention, but as we have transitioned into the media-based world in which we now live, this element of advertising has become even more prevalent. Every day, we view, create, and interact with an immense amount of content, particularly through social media, and in the midst of […] How do you gain the attention of millions of people?  That, is the question that advertisers and marketers face every single day.

Being an advertising major, I am very open to seeing ads.  I enjoy watching new commercials and observing what different brands are doing to be creative and stay in touch with their target demographics.  Nothing makes me happier than seeing a creative and clever campaign.

Take Coke:

While this is a more traditional advertisement, it is so clever because it is make an awkward situation – meeting people on the first day of college a fun one.  Honestly, it upsets me that I wasn’t able to come to college on my first day and share a Coke with another student.  To me, this grabs my attention because it is relatable and created by a brand I know and love.  This advertisement also catches my attention because it is found on YouTube, which makes the advertisement highly sharable. The first time I viewed this ad was actually through someone’s Facebook page who shared it from YouTube.  However, this advertisement stands out to me – not necessarily the average consumer.

In this digital age, it is even more difficult to grab people’s attention.  I get annoyed when I see content that blocks me from what I want to see, especially on the web.  I want to listen to a YouTube video when I want to.  I don’t want to have to sit and watch a minute ad in order to view my content.  I want to be able to go to a homepage and not have an annoying homepage takeover blocking what I need to do or get done.  While banner ads are fine, I am not receptive to them because I mentally block them out.  Why would I pay attention to an ad when I know where they are and how to avoid them?

One of my favorite ways that advertisers have gained my attention is through Instagram.  I love being able to scroll through photos of my friends and celebrities that I follow to see one photo that captures their day or week. Advertisers have gotten creative by placing promoted ads in my feed that I often don’t think about.  I am not the type of person that looks at an Instagram account name until I see the photo.  With that, I also do not notice the promoted notification on the upper right hand side of the post.  By having these Instagram ads in my feed, I am able to like the post and be interactive with a brand or product.  I enjoy being able to see new products, and eventually when the shop button gets implemented it will be a great way to make purchasing products found on Instagram easier. In this example, you can see that this Target ad is promoting the clothing being worn by the model.  To me, I can tell it is an advertisement because of the pose and clothing that is being worn.  I enjoy this Instagram advertisement because I can look at the post and just scroll through it.  This ad is also relevant to me because I enjoy Lilly Pulitzer and I ended up going to that event.  While this post can be seen as intrusive by some people, I enjoy the simplicity and ability to just scroll through the remainder of my feed if I want to.

Advertisers also are able to gain my attention by using Snapchat stories.  When I go through a Snapchat Live story, I see sponsored advertisements.  Since this technology is new, I enjoy seeing the content that is relevant to me.  Most of the ads are similar to my lifestyle and brands that I know of, use, and wear so I enjoy them sometimes.  Snapchat also has been a good way to reach millennials and show trailer videos to which I personally enjoy because I don’t watch enough TV to view movie trailers.

The only issue with these Snapchat ads is that you can tell they are advertisements because it says “Sponsored” on the very bottom of the screen and the time circle also goes away during the duration of the ad.  I personally think that these snapchat ads could be more effective if it was content that was clearly recorded with a phone and thus looked more authentic.  I think this would help consumers feel like we are not being directly advertised to. This would also prevent people from clicking through the advertisements.

We Are Your Friends

Open Snapchat. Snap this picture. BAM — thanks for the follow @WAYFmovie. #WAYF pic.twitter.com/88BOtVcRNu

An example of a trailer that was promoted using Snapchat was the Zac Efron movie We Are Your Friends.  I could not find the specific Snapchat trailer, but I did find this Tweet which is promoting people to add the movie on snapchat to get updates about the movie. I knew from social media (ie. Snapchat, Twitter, Facebook and bloggers) that Zac Efron was having a movie come out, but I had no background on the storyline because I am a busy college student.  My first priority is not to look at movie trailers but rather to finish my homework and catch up on Twitter.  But, one day when I was looking through my Snapchat stories I noticed the movie trailer.  Not only was I able to watch the trailer, but the movie resonated with me weeks after the movie’s release date.  While I have not yet seen the movie, I enjoy Zac Efron and I know I want to see the movie in the future.

Trying to spark conversation in this digital age is becoming harder and harder.  It’s a new medium which has no limits.  However, even though there are no limits, it can be challenging to make consumers notice your advertisement and create conversation.  I personally think that digital advertisements is the new way to advertise to millennials because of the receptivity of my generation.

The skip button, the little x at the top left and the mute button; all of these things are ways people ignore ads. But a few brands and advertisers are figuring out how to make an impression and engage with consumers. In the social media world it’s hard to stay relevant to your consumer, there […]
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