Snapchat, which has been reluctant to impose ads onto its users, may now force users to view ads for three seconds before skipping them.
Snapchat, which has been reluctant to impose ads onto its users, may now force users to view ads for three seconds before skipping them.
At the moment, Snapchat’s current video ads are easily dismissed with a tap of the screen. However, one of the company’s top advertisers has said that it sees “average view times on ads that barely reach a second.”
According to a report by AdAge, Snapchat's ad sales team is applying pressure on internal executives to approve the new format so the service can appease brands and attract more ad dollars, this advertiser says. A publishing partner also confirmed there have been talks with Snapchat about trying the three-second skippable ads.
An advertiser from a brand that works closely with the messaging service said, “Advertisers are not spending as much as they have previously with Snapchat. They have to do something that draws more interest from advertisers, and they are getting more aggressive to address the market's needs.”
The report pointed out the Media Rating Council has determined two seconds is the minimum time needed for a video ad to be considered “viewable,” and if Snapchat can force more three-second views it would go a long way to addressing viewability concerns. For now, it is unknown whether Snapchat will implement this three-second ad limit.
Snapchat may provide the perfect medium for maintaining relationships with close friends, without the pressure to present oneself in extraordinary form, say scientists who delved into why people use the addictive social platform which allows short, quick posts. Due to its brevity, Snapchat could be the best form of communication in a world where people struggle with a seemingly diminishing attention span.
However, researchers found that the interest and popularity of Snapchat goes beyond just its simplicity. "People use Snapchat a lot because of its entertainment and functional needs," said J J Delacruz, graduate student at Texas Tech University in the US. "For certain people, it enables them to overcome communication apprehension by using a different means of communication where they don't have a threat in their face. At the same time, there are people who are addicted to it," said Delacruz.
In other words, Snapchat, because of its brevity, can provide the perfect medium for those who are hesitant about communicating their life to a public audience, but at the same time can become addictive because those same properties allow for multiple, quick posts that only last a few seconds. "I noticed people were using it all the time. They are constantly on it," said Narissra Punyanunt-Carter, associate professor at Texas Tech University.
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