Snapchat Advertising Costs – A Breakdown Of Each Offering
Last Updated: April 21, 2020.
Do you want to advertise on Snapchat? Here’s a breakdown of Snapchat advertising costs at each level of their ad platform. Want to learn more about the specifics of Snap Ad campaigns? Read our blog!
Do you want to advertise on Snapchat? Here’s a breakdown of Snapchat advertising costs at each level of their ad platform. Want to learn more about the specifics of Snap Ad campaigns? Read our blog!
1. SNAP ADS
With 229 million daily active users, Snapchat is no small potato. Snap Ads is the newest available offering from Snapchat. These are mobile video ads. You can also add the choice of an interactive element to the ads. The swipe-up rate for Snap Ads is 5X higher than the average click-through rate for other comparable social platforms. Here's an example of a recent Snap Ad campaign from Gatorade:
That Gatorade Snap Ads campaign was actually a mini game within Snapchat. When the user swiped up, they were able to play an 8-bit version of a tennis game that celebrated Serena Williams' 23rd Grand Slam victory. The average time spent in this ad was over 3 minutes (sidenote: that is an AMAZINGLY high level of engagement for an ad), and it was viewed almost 30 million times. Read more about that campaign here. The cost for Snap Ads varies by campaign. The cost for Snap Ads campaigns start at $3,000/month in ad spend. This obviously does not include the agency fee, or the cost to create the creative that you would run as the ad. If you’re interested in a Snap Ads campaign, let us know! View the complete guide to Snap Ads here. Bare Minerals recently ran a Snap Ads campaign, read about that here. Update in January 2017: Snapchat launched new ads allowing you to deeplink, which means you can send users from Snapchat to somewhere outside the app (i.e. you can drive users to download an app, go to a website, etc.). This is an extremely valuable new feature. This is crucial timing as Instagram Stories just launched ads within Stories a few days ago as well.
Update in April 2017: Snapchat launched a new "Snap to Store" Snap Ads feature that focuses on generating online to offline conversions.
Update in May 2017: Snapchat adds new 'Max Reach' ad format within Snap Ads campaigns. Learn more here.
2. SPONSORED LENSES
Snapchat Sponsored Lenses are on the next tier of pricing for ads on the platform. The cost for Sponsored Lenses varies depending on the day of the week, holiday, trends, etc. A general rule of thumb for Snapchat Sponsored Lenses costs is this: $450,000 per day Sunday through Thursday, $500,000 for Fridays and Saturdays, and $700,000 plus for holidays or special events (like the Super Bowl).
As has been reported many times, the Taco Bell Snapchat Sponsored Lens received over 224 million views. Also, Snapchatters tend to play with Sponsored Lenses for an average of 20 seconds. Think about that last sentence for a second. People on Snapchat "play" with ads. On most other platforms, people hate ads. On Snapchat, users play with them. So, on a bang for your buck level, Sponsored Lenses are cheaper than Discover ads.
3. NATIONWIDE SPONSORED GEOFILTER
Nationwide Sponsored Geofilters are a new offering from Snapchat. McDonald's did the first one about a month ago. It is currently unknown exactly how much this ad offering costs, but our estimates peg the number at about a fifth of the cost of Sponsored Lenses.
VANS recently ran a campaign that included a nationwide sponsored geofilter. You can read more about that case study here. The campaign had over 98 million views.
4. SNAPCHAT DISCOVER
Snapchat Discover ads are the most expensive offering. Right now, Snapchat Discover ads start at $50,000. Snapchat Discover ads get premium placement (at the very top of the app), and are usually reserved for publishers or big brands. And that $50,000 number? That's a daily rate. Snapchat recently said that Cosmo, one of its leading publishers, gets several million views per day on its Snapchat Discover feed. At the top of the image below is where Snapchat Discover ads are featured.
Snapchat Discover ads used to start at $750,000 for one day, but a couple months ago Snapchat dropped those rates dramatically. To get the current $50,000 rate, you can do what is known as a “takeover” of a Snapchat Discover publisher channel. Getting inside of a “Live Story”, which are also featured in the Discover section, can cost around $250,000. Snapchat also recently opened up programmatic advertising for the Discover section, but that is not yet available to the public.
Update in November 2018: Snapchat has introduced a much more affordable $50 tier which has encouraged many brands to try the AR ad experience. The $50 offering is called the "Snap Ads to AR" and features a 10-second ad between videos in Snapchat Discover. Users can swipe up on these 10-second ads to experience the AR. It does have limitations, but it's made it possible for many small businesses to afford AR ads.
5. SNAP TO UNLOCK FILTERS
"Snap to Unlock" filters are one of Snapchat's newest ad offerings. Recently, Kendall Jenner partnered with Garage Magazine to create a Snap to Unlock filter. There was a code in a Garage Magazine issue that, when snapped, would unlock a special filter. To see this filter in action, see the image on the left. The image below is being seen in subway stations in New York and DC, and in parts of Los Angeles. It's a new "Snap to Unlock."
6. SNAP TO UNLOCK CODES
"Snap to Unlock" ads are the latest in Snapchat's ad offering. The image to the left is being seen in subway stations in New York and DC, and in parts of Los Angeles. It's a new "Snap to Unlock" ad promoting 'The Girl On The Train' movie. The cost structure for this ad is still unknown, but it's believed to have the second lowest entry point, just after local geofilters.
7. SPONSORED LOCAL GEOFILTERS
Sponsored Local Geofilters are the cheapest of all Snapchat ad offerings. The cost for Local Geofilters can be as little as $5. Snapchat recently inked a deal with Foursquare for their Geofilters. Now, with Foursquare-powered data, the geofilters will be more accurate, and therefore more effective. (Learn more about how to use Geofilters in our post about "Snaphacking"). The ROI on geofilters can be quite high. We ran a campaign a few weeks ago that got over 23,000 views and the cost was under $7. Also, Snapchat recently announced "Annual Geofilters", where they offer a discount if you buy filters in bulk. They are pushing companies to sign up for this. They also allow you to swap out the creative from time to time. This can work for smaller companies, but it's great for larger brands that want to constantly have Geofilters be a part of their advertising campaigns.
IMPORTANT NOTE: For special events, Snapchat sometimes will raise the cost for geofilters. We've seen this number to be as high as $20,000 for a one block by one block area for one hour. Read this piece for more details.
8. SNAPCHAT INFLUENCER PARTNERSHIPS
This is not an official form of Snapchat Advertising through the company, but it's a very effective ad format. Working with influencers to have them create content on your Snapchat account through a "Snapchat Takeover" works very well. You can also sponsor the snaps of influencers by way of product placements. Or you can get more blatant and hire an influencer for a series of Snapchat pictures and videos, promoting your brand. If you can get the right influencer with a targeted demographic following that matches that of your brand, it can be a great campaign. We've seen/done countless examples of this. If this is something you're interested in, it's one of our specialties :).
9. "SNAPISODES"
This is another unofficial form of Snapchat Advertising. It's also quite new. Closely related to influencer marketing, "Snapisodes" is a new take on creating high quality, episodic organic content on the platform. This content can be created by influencers, or by your own brand. Learn more about Snapisodes here.10. "PROMOTED STORIES"
During Snapchat's quarterly earnings call on February 6, 2018, CSO Imran Khan announced that a new ad format, Promoted Stories, will be available to all advertisers in the coming weeks. We will update you further when we learn more.11. "STORY ADS"
In April 2018, Snap released the new Story Ads offering. This new ad format that allows advertisers to reach their audiences with a branded tile in the Discover feed. With one tap, Snapchatters can jump into a collection of 3-20 Snaps and dive deeper into your brand. With Attachments, viewers can even swipe up to watch a trailer, install an app, or buy a product. It’s a pretty amazing new offering. We highly recommend it.More reading: In July 2016 it was discovered that Snapchat filed a patent to serve a new type of ads. This new system of advertising uses "object recognition" to serve users sponsored filters. Learn more about this new patent in our official post covering the development, Snapchat Files New Patent to Serve Ads Based on Objects in Your Snaps.
RELATED: Snapchat is opening up the original content section of its app to more advertisers. Creating co-branded ad content there is now an option, although the production cost is much higher.
RUMOR: It is believed that the Bitmoji section of Snapchat will be available soon for sponsored Bitmojis, GIFs, augmented reality offerings, and more.
REACH/FREQUENCY: Snap has recently introduced a new beta ad product akin to television advertising, read more about it here.
LONGER ADS: Snapchat announced on September 23, 2019 that ad units can now be up to 3 minutes long. This is a very unique (but awesome) feature. They also stated that swipe ups are available on six second commercial ads and goal-based bidding to optimize for 15-second video views and other items is available. The evolution of Snap as a key advertising platform continues.
DYNAMIC ADS: In October 2019, Snapchat announced that dynamic ads are now available! With Dynamic Ads, advertisers can now automatically create ads in real time based on extensive product catalogs that may contain hundreds of thousands of products. These ads are then served to Snapchat users based on their interests using a variety of templates provided by Snap. This is a welcomed addition that brands should definitely take advantage of. And with 210 daily active users, there's a ton of potential here!
IMPRESSION BIDDING FOR A/R LENSES: On January 31, 2020, Snapchat announced. that impression bidding for A/R lenses became available for advertisers of all sizes. The targeting abilities are the same as regular Snap ads. From Snapchat themselves:
Here are some benefits of A/R Lenses to our advertisers in the Auction:
The flexibility of non-guaranteed buying, without a reservation or reservation window.
No additional spend or audience minimum required, only the daily minimum.
Ad set mutability, and ability to edit and optimize without risking cancellation.
A wider variety of targeting capabilities ie. more countries available, point radius,re-engagement audiences.
CPM efficiencies relative to RxF due to its non-guaranteed nature.
Snapchat is now at 229 million daily active users. Don't hesitate any longer to start advertising on the platform! Contact us today if you're interested!