Snapchat Debuts Sponsored Snap Advertising

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 teens, 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.