Snap’s invite-only creator program was a buzzy topic of conversation last year in the influencer industry.
The program, known as Snap Stars, gained initial popularity for its lucrative paydays based on its stories ad-revenue-sharing model.
But these payouts aren’t the only way Snap Stars can make money. They can also use the platform to land brand deals and build relationships with companies to promote their products and services in videos.
For instance, online travel agency Priceline was among the first brands to work with Snapchat creators through the Snap Star Collab Studio program early last year.
Creators developed branded content for Priceline, which lived as a sponsored post on the creator’s Snap Story, and then was boosted with paid media as a Snap Ad, a skippable ad format, to more places across the app. Over half of users watched the ad in full, beating Snap’s benchmarks for Snap Ads by over 2X, the company said.
Los Angeles lifestyle influencer Mia Finney worked with Priceline last year, and since taking that deal, she’s seen more paid brand deals come in through Snap. The brands can find her within the studio — any creator in the Snap Stars program can opt into sharing their data for brand collaborations to reach out, making it an easy process to accept new paid opportunities.
“The creator studio and these tools that Snapchat are releasing are going to be definitely game-changing in the creator economy,” Finney told Business Insider.
The Snap Star Collab Studio program is similar to TikTok’s creator marketplace where brands can pitch creators directly.
Beauty brands are harnessing Snap’s AR capabilities
Snapchat is known for its augmented reality tools, and the platform created a fund last year paying creators who make AR lenses.
Advertisers have been taking advantage of its capabilities. E.l.f Beauty, for example, ran an AR lens campaign on Snap that included a 3D Bitmoji. The company tapped three Snap Stars for the campaign: a UCLA soccer star, a fitness creator, and a US Navy veteran. These creators encouraged their fans to follow them getting ready while applying E.l.f. products. The Snap Stars also created their own content with the E.l.f. AR lens, which they shared on their own feeds.
Like E.l.f., other beauty brands, including L’Oreal and NYX Cosmetics, have jumped on the creator studio to connect with top creators like Chantel Jeffries.
“I was using the products and posting on my Snapchat about them a few days prior, and then they reached out,” Jeffries said of L’Oreal and NYX Cosmetics. The brands found her content within Snap and reached out to her on the platform through the creator studio.
“It was great because I naturally use NYX and L’Oreal products all the time in my ‘get ready with me’ videos,” Jeffries said.
Popular short-form video creator Katie Feeney, who is a Penn State college student and lifestyle influencer, promoted Comcast on her Snapchat last year, and lifestyle creator Katie Austin partnered with Kohl’s.
Kohl’s found Austin through the Snap Star Collab Studio and asked her to create both a short-form and long-form video promoting the company. The company took the long-form video and converted it to a Story Ad with paid media behind it. Austin’s Snap story promoting the brand got over 177,000 views.
“It’s an important thing to have as an influencer, and to have on the platforms that you create content for,” Jeffries said about brand studios. “Nowadays, so many people are working with brands, and it’s great to be able to have new avenues to find different brands. It also takes less focus away from you being able to create content and focus on that.”
Read the full article here