The number of creators posting on Snapchat grew by more than 40% year-on-year in Q4 2024. That resulted in one billion public Snaps per month from October to December.
CORQ spoke to Emily McDonnell, Snap Inc’s head of creator partnerships in the UK and Nordics, about the app’s growth and how brands can reach its influencers’ engaged and trusting audiences.
Snapchat started as a tool for family and friends to communicate, but creators are increasingly seeing it as a place to build audiences. “In the past four to six years, we have developed the tools for users to have a verified public profile, Story content, Spotlight content, a monetisation programme and brands that can work with the talent,” McDonnell says.
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For her, a key reason to partner with Snapchat creators is the unfiltered and honest communication which defines the platform. “The way people show up on the app, it’s more relatable. It’s real and it’s raw,” she says. This leads to a high level of trust and sense of community between the creators and their audiences. Intimate Q&A sessions are frequent, allowing followers to get closer to their favourite creators, and – says McDonnell – they post things they would never share on more polished platforms such as Instagram, YouTube and even TikTok.
One way to connect with Snapchat users is through influencer collaborations. Specific creators are chosen to become part of the Snap Stars programme, which means their content is featured by the platform. In the UK, prominent Snap Stars include Grace Keeling, Kika Mendoza, Ella Thomas, Aitch, Chloe Burrows, PK Humble and Millie T. These creators are part of the app’s Revenue Share Programme and are advised to post 25 to 30 Stories per day, as well as three to five weekly Spotlights (the Snapchat equivalent to Reels or TikToks).
Spotlights can be monetised in the same way as Stories, making the platform even more appealing to creators. In fact, many report Snapchat is their most financially lucrative revenue stream after achieving Snap Star status.
The exact requirements to become a Snap Star are confidential but McDonnell says certain qualities are non-negotiable: creators must have a strong personality, post frequently and be culturally relevant. “Brand safety is also key for us, because we reach such a young audience,” she adds.
Snapchat has a large, hugely active youth user base (the platform reaches over 90% of 13- to 24-year-olds), but it is worth noting 45% of its 21 million monthly active users in the UK are over the age of 25.
Brands can work with creators through the app’s paid partnership tool or, for bigger campaigns, via the Snap Star Collab Studio. Creators have become a significant focus for the company, which is working to make its platform as desirable as possible for influencers, McDonnell says. Most recently, Snapchat launched a partnership with influencer marketing platform Later, which gives Snap Stars improved discoverability, automated content scheduling and a suite of growth and monetisation tools to manage brand collaborations.
Another route to connecting with users is partnering with the app on lenses – nearly 70% of users utilise these every day and more than four million have been created by developers from all over the world. For new campaigns, events or collaborations, brands are seeing success by producing bespoke branded lenses.
For example, Old Mout’s 2024 campaign included in-app ads, a lens, and a custom AR and OOH experience in Liverpool. The campaign exceeded the brand’s benchmarks, achieving a 4.9% sales lift and a £1.36 ROI, leading to incremental sales of £445,000.
TikTok is leaning into live features and social commerce, and Substack is expanding its video offering, but these aren’t things Snapchat is worried about. “We’re an ‘and’ platform, not an ‘or’ platform,” McDonnell says.
By Dina Zubi, news and features writer for CORQ.
