Snapchat for Brands: Steps to Increase Snap Views & Story Completion Rates

According to Snapalytics research, the recent autoplay update in Snapchat has increased visibility of more snap stories, but (as expected) also led to fewer people watching complete stories.

There are many theories on why viewership of complete stories declined. One simple reason is that users didn’t intentionally choose to watch that persons’ snaps; the story just started playing automatically. Another reason is because some people think they are watching a friend’s snaps — and all of a sudden are watching another person’s story — so they swipe away to go back to see what other friends are doing.

Research reveals that the Snapchat autoplay feature increased story opens by 2%, but reduced story completion by around 5%.

The good news is that open rates have increased with the update — which is a huge opportunity to grab attention from those who might not have intentionally chosen to watch your stories. Brands that can hook their viewers within a few snaps will improve story completion rates.

Here are some ways you can increase snap viewership and retention:

1. Tell More Snap Stories for Shorter Periods of Time.

Instead of telling one or two long snap stories each day — focus on breaking it up — to tell four or more shorter stories throughout the day. This will help you earn more eyeballs on your stories.

This doesn’t mean you should stop telling long stories (because those can be very important), but your snap strategy should include more short snap stories spread out if you want to increase views.

Snapchat stories over 20 snaps have a significant drop-off rate:

The best approach to increase story completion is to tell stories under 10 snaps when possible.
This doesn’t mean you can’t keep viewers longer – but it depends on the content and type of story you’re telling. It also depends on if you have a loyal community who cares about watching your snaps.

2. Hook Your Viewers Within Your First Few Snaps

Now that you’re earning more viewers on your first snaps, it’s crucial that you captivate them quickly. As we’ve seen, completion rates have dropped (which means you literally have a few snaps to grab attention).

This is why it can be helpful for brands to storyboard out their introductions to help them plan out ways to grab attention. Al Jazeera says that their “first five snaps are always storyboarded to set up the piece…[which] has led to higher retention. Beyond that, things can be more improvised, usually up to around 10 snaps.”

You can definitely increase completion rates and keep viewers engaged by having shorter snaps. Instead of using the full 10 seconds, you could keep a snap under 5 seconds — so that viewers need to watch the next snap to get more of the story before deciding to stay or move on.

Treat each snap like an appetizer so that you’re giving bites of great content (but leaving viewers hungry for more).

3. Use Text to Tell Stories So You’re Not Ignoring Those Without Earbuds (Or Muted Sound)

Think about all the times you’re on Snapchat and unable to have sound on for whatever reason. Snapchat claims that over 2/3 of users have sound on — which means it’s possible that 1/3 of your audience has volume turned off.

This is why it’s critical to keep muted viewers captivated by always including text on your screen to help tell your story. Not including text means you’re ignoring those viewers (and will likely drop off since your content isn’t consumable).

Al Jazeera has a Snapchat style guide for their journalists and encourages correspondents to include text in their snaps (left aligned and white). “Snapchat told [them] this increases viewer retention, which it has found to be true; a story with no text has 45% viewer retention rate compared to up to 90% retention when there was text throughout.”

4. Track Your Snap Analytics To Learn What Times/Days You Get More Engagement & Visibility

Aside from telling stories throughout your day (and keeping stories short and sweet), it’s important to track your engagement rates (e.g. snap backs, screenshots) and view counts throughout your day.

You should know when you’re likely to get more views (mornings, afternoons, evenings). You should also know what days of the week you’re more likely to get visibility.

The time of day (and day of week) will vary depending on your target audience. I notice a substantial increase in views during the early morning hours for the accounts that I manage. However, that might not be true for you. Make sure to measure view count and engagement to help you plan out your best times to snap.

So how are you increasing views and engagement on Snapchat? Let me know in the comments or snap me at: mikepdelgado

Mike Delgado

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