Written on 14^th October 2016 by Dsuk

Snapchat geofilters: A game changer for events?

New technologies, social media and apps play an increasingly important role in events. Of course, the team at TAG always have their finger on the pulse, and here we take a look at the use of Snapchat’s on-demand geofilters, plus some brand-new features, in the events industry.

When you’re considering using social media for your event, Snapchat might not immediately jump out at you as an option. Perhaps this platform has passed you by, or it doesn’t seem to quite fit into your social media strategy, but there’s actually a lot to get excited about when it comes to adopting this tool for event marketing – including on-demand geofilters, and the fact that the app has approximately 200 million monthly active users, which is double the amount of LinkedIn.

What exactly are Snapchat geofilters?

Snapchat now allows businesses to create their own filters to use as a marketing tool for business and events. You’ve heard of Snapchat filters, right? The stickers, frames and drawings that can be laid over images and videos – but these on-demand geofilters are available on the messaging app based on location, and are sponsored by advertisers.

These customised geography-based filters permit the use of branding and logos, whereas Community geofilters do not. These filters are temporary – they last for 30 days only – and need to be made available in an area of a minimum of 20,000 square feet in size. They must also be approved by the Snapchat team, to ensure they meet design and technical standards.  You will be informed when your filter is live and ready to use, and attendees at your event can use them for free.

For all intents and purposes, as the geofilters are tied to where the event is taking place, this is proving to be a great tool for increasing valuable and meaningful user engagement at your event – particularly among the millennial generation, who are generally turned off by more traditional forms of advertising. These are adverts that people are actually paying attention to, and they’re also relatively inexpensive to create and implement.

What about the new geofilter stickers?

Most recently, to celebrate the official kick-off of the summer 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Snapchat debuted a new set of geofilters stickers, Bitmojis and lenses, which was a great way to encourage engagement and buzz among those who attended the games.

In addition to a slew of new Olympic-themed features, Snapchat also featured exclusive video content through its Live Stories; also adding a temporary NBC Olympics channel to its Discover channel – and this is something we can see making its way into the events industry in a big way.

In fact, Snapchat is ideal for events

These features have proven to result in high engagement levels with users, and they are also a low-cost way of promoting your event.

Events are, of course, exciting, imaginative and powerful, but the truth is that they are temporary experiences –  they are here one day, gone the next. This communications platform, and all the tools that come with it, seems to match up perfectly with this philosophy – and at this event, corporate and travel management company, we are embracing the technology to the fullest.

Source: IB Times

If you’re unsure how Snapchat fits into your overall social media event marketing strategy, the events and global travel services team at TAG are here to offer a helping hand.

We can also design a Snapchat filter for your event and take care of the approval process.