SNAP Brings Sponsored AR Filters for Advertisers on Snapchat
Snap Inc. SNAP has unveiled a groundbreaking augmented reality (AR) advertising feature called Sponsored AR Filters on Snapchat to expand brands' outreach beyond the pre-capture Lens Carousel.
This innovative ad placement occurs after Snapchatters capture their content with the Snapchat Camera, accessible by swiping to the post-capture Filter Carousel. With an impressive five billion Snaps created every day, brands now have the opportunity to participate in more shareable moments and fully immerse themselves in the Snapchat Camera experience from start to finish.
Sponsored AR Filters offer brands the ability to integrate seamlessly into both major cultural events and everyday moments, ensuring maximum exposure and relevance. Advertisers can streamline filter production by utilizing fun, new templates that allow them to upload existing assets and build filters quickly. These templates include AR face filters, location-based overlays, countdown timers, quiz generators and more.
Leveraging Sponsored AR Filters alongside pre-capture Sponsored Lenses guarantees optimal visibility and impact across the entire Snapchat Camera experience, maximizing brand awareness and engagement.
Integration of calls to action enables advertisers to capture valuable mid-funnel signals, guiding users toward specific conversion actions and driving measurable campaign results.
With no outside production costs required, advertisers can effortlessly create Sponsored AR Filters in under 10 minutes using Lens Web Builder, a free DIY tool for Filter and Lens creation. This allows brands of all sizes to participate without the expense of traditional production and storyboarding.
To get started with Sponsored AR Filters, advertisers can utilize two main methods. Firstly, they can build AR Filters using Lens Web Builder by following a simple process. This involves uploading their creatives, saving them to their Lens Folder and finally publishing the AR Filter.
Alternatively, advertisers can create Sponsored AR Filter campaigns through Ads Manager. This process begins by building the ad via Advance Create on Ads Manager, selecting camera and AR Filter under placements and then setting up the remaining components of the campaign. Once the filter is created, advertisers can browse for it within Ads Manager and proceed to publish their ad campaign, effectively launching their Sponsored AR Filter on Snapchat's platform.
Snap’s Efforts to Aid Declining Ad Revenues
The company is suffering from declining ad revenues as advertising partners across many industries are decreasing their marketing budgets, especially in the face of operating environment headwinds, inflation-driven cost pressure and rising costs of capital. In many high-growth sectors, businesses are reassessing investment levels amid the rising cost of capital, which led to cutbacks in spending on advertising. The persistent decline in the price-per-ad impression is likely to dent advertising revenues for SNAP in the near term.
In the fourth quarter of 2023, the brand-oriented advertising business declined 3% year over year, while the direct-response advertising business grew 3% year over year.
Snapchat surpassed 800 million monthly active users in the fourth quarter of 2023. Snap’s fourth-quarter revenues reached $1.36 billion, increasing 5% year over year. The company’s total revenues for 2023 were $4.6 billion, which remained flat year over year.
Snap has partnered with Microsoft MSFT Advertising to power Sponsored Links within My AI. This partnership leverages Microsoft Advertising's Ads for Chat API to enable the seamless delivery of relevant links during conversations. This collaboration is expected to help partners reach Snapchatters when they have expressed potential interest in their offerings.
In addition, Snapchat added a way for developers to create filters with ChatGPT. The new beta of Lens Studio for developers includes the ability to create filters with ChatGPT. Lens developers will be able to use a new 3D face mask generator to create generative AI face lenses. These new developer tools announced include the ability for multiple people to work on projects at the same time.
Snap and other competitors, including Alphabet GOOGL, have been facing challenges in their advertising revenues due to fierce competition from platforms like TikTok and Meta Platforms’ META Instagram, as well as changes in Apple's app privacy policies.
In its race to target TV ad dollars, Alphabet allowed third-party (Nielsen and comScore) tagging of YouTube videos to determine the effectiveness of ads on YouTube versus ads shown on TV. META is pumping resources into developing generative AI on its platform in an effort to combat declining ad revenues.
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