So, you finally got Twitter figured out, and along comes Snapchat. What’s that about? Should you join that too?
Snapchat is the one of the latest social messaging platforms. (There are tons of these – literally – that rise and fall in popularity every single year.) It’s exactly what it says it is. You post a short video to the platform. A message goes out to your followers encouraging them to stop whatever it is they happen to be doing, and go check out what you’ve posted. Your video message will stay saved to the website for anywhere from 10 seconds to 30 days, depending on the type of post it is.
Typically your posts are automatically deleted as soon as they’ve been viewed. But, if no one views them, they’ll stay active and visible longer. If your followers want to hold on to one of your posts indefinitely, they can save it. So, as with any social media platform, think carefully about what you post. If it’s something you think might be embarrassing at some point in the future, don’t post it!
Marketing with Snapchat
Most businesses still aren’t really sure how to use Snapchat to market their brands. Taco Bell and Sour Patch Kids are doing pretty well on it, though. One thing to note is that the majority of users are Generation Z. These are people between the ages of 1 and 19. 81% of users are under 25, and 50% are under 17. A lot of companies just aren’t sure if that’s the right audience for them, how to talk to that audience, and how to use Snapchat’s features (particularly since the message is automatically deleted after a while) to reach that audience.
Snapchat for DJs
Don’t be put off by Snapchat or the big companies’ lack of interest in the platform as a marketing tool. Snapchat can be a great marketing tool for DJs.
The key to making Snapchat work for you is to offer your followers exclusive access. Give them behind-the-scenes content, slice-of-life vignettes, and as many special offers as you can possibly give. Snapchat has a number of features, like rainbow waterfalls that pour out of the user’s open mouth, a flower garland that will encircle your head, a dog face that you can paste over your own, and lots more. Make use of some of those to inject some humor into your posts.
If you’re already using other social platforms for your brand, and offering unique content on those, you have to do something different on Snapchat. Don’t offer the same stuff on each platform. It won’t be unique anymore, right? Figure out how you want to use each platform to market yourself. Perhaps Facebook is for chatting with your followers; maybe you use Twitter to announce your gigs. Your YouTube account might focus solely on showcasing your sets. Then maybe Snapchat can be the place you offer free tickets to your gigs.
You’ll need to figure out how to make it all work for you. Marketing yourself across all the possible channels is no walk in the park. It’s why big brands hire marketing teams to work it all out for them. DJs even a decade ago certainly didn’t have to worry about all this.
But, look at it from the other side. DJs today who can take some time out of their day to figure out even some of the marketing side for themselves are much further ahead than the DJs of old. It’s more work, yes. But, having control of how, when and where to market yourself could be the key to your success.
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