Snapchat Inc., the widely acclaimed photo-sharing application, is extending its boundaries from the digital realm to college campuses. It is testing a creative, groundbreaking partnership with several college newspapers. This liaison aims to generate engaging weekly live campus events, exclusively distributed on Snapchat’s new service: “Campus Publisher Stories.” These stories, shared and crafted by young minds right on the grounds of academia, will depict the diverse, everyday campus events from around the country.
In a recent blog post, Snapchat revealed its unprecedented collaboration with a new ensemble of college newspaper publishers. Their joint venture involves the creation of “Campus Stories,” an innovative concept that varies significantly from the “Discover Stories” launched back in 2014. The new feature will focus majorly on live events unravelling on college campuses—providing a slice-of-life snapshot of the bustling student lifestyle.
Snapchat officially announced the launch of Campus Stories, showcasing a dedicated editorial team that will be held accountable for the weekly production and curation of these immersive stories in their multimedia application. According to a report by industry-leading source Adweek, these weekly campus stories will be strategically monetized using Snap ads. All revenues generated from these ads will be directly passed onto the partner newspapers, forming part of a mutually beneficial revenue-sharing agreement.
The underlying strategy behind Campus Stories is to attract a larger teenage audience to the platform, potentially exceeding its competitors in the United States for the first time. As per predictions by market research firms, the platform’s user growth is expected to surge following the feature’s launch.
Snapchat’s user demographic currently skews younger than that of Facebook’s Instagram, hence, introducing a service that resonates with campus life could prove to be a significant advantage. According to Emarketer, the inception of this captivating feature is expected to propel Snapchat’s revenue and increase its share of US social network users up to an impressive 40.8 percent.
Snapchat’s user base in the 12 to 24 age group is forecasted to surpass both Instagram and Facebook’s for the first time in 2017. This surge in the younger demographic will undoubtedly increase Snapchat’s share of US social network users to 40.8 percent once Campus Stories is fully operational.
Despite Facebook boasting about a hefty $9 billion in advertising revenue—a steep rise of approximately 47 percent over the last year—Snapchat’s strategy leans towards making their platform increasingly appealing to advertisers. The aim is to leverage their demographics, particularly younger users, through the anticipated rollout of the Campus Stories feature.
The university campus is an ideal start point for this venture, given that Facebook—currently the largest social media network—traced its roots back to a similar environment. Snapchat’s venture into “Campus Publisher Stories” not only represents a bold step towards retaining its millennial user base but also an opportunity to boost its advertising revenues.
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