Snapchat: a multimedia app that allows its users to send and receive time-sensitive photographs and messages. The platform blew up shortly after its release to the app store in 2011, finding popularity in young audiences aged 18-25. For the first time, living in the moment with technology was easy; sending photographs to friends was both inviting and simple. But now, Snapchat Plus is offering new features to change the app and keep it relevant.
Since its release, the app has withstood many modifications alongside the needs of its ever-changing audience base. The current app stands as not only an easy media-sharing platform, but also a news source and method for the geological sharing of everyday happenings.
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While the app is still primarily utilized by its users as a way to casually communicate with friends and family, a recent subscription stands to make these interactions more interesting. Snapchat Plus allows its subscribers to access exclusive features, including but not limited to custom app icons and ghost trails. In this article, we’ll explore the benefits of Snapchat Plus and how it’ll impact creators.
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Features of Snapchat Plus
According to snap.com, there are a number of perks that coincide with a subscription to Snapchat Plus. These include, but are not limited to:
- Priority story replies: A method of creating more visibility for oneself in the interaction with creators
- Post-view emojis: Change the default chat box icon to your own customizable emoji following the view of your media
- Bitmoji backgrounds: Give your avatar a new setting to appear before all of your friends
- App icons: Replace the traditional yellow Snapchat ghost to a design of your choice
- Custom story expiration: Ditch the 24-hour limit, keep a story up anywhere from an hour to a week
- Custom notification sounds: Like a text message, you can set a “ringtone” of sorts for different Snappers
- Custom color borders: Create your perfect snap by choosing a color of your choice as you capture a photo
While the list is extensive, many of these features can be summed up as methods of customizing the Snapchat experience to better cater to one’s preferences. Some additional features include:
- Chat Wallpapers: Change the way your messages appear in conversation with your friends
- Pin #1 BFF: Choose who tops your list of best friends with this feature
- Best friend solar system: See how close you are to the top of your friends’ best friends lists
- Story rewatch statistics: View how many people have rewatched your story, without the additional detail of whom rewatches
- Ghost trails: View where a friend has travelled in the past 24 hours, granted their location is shared
- Snapchat for web: Use internet browsers to message and call friends as opposed to the app
- Snapchat+ Badge: Add a black star next to your display name to showcase your membership status
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Availability of Snapchat Plus
Currently, Snapchat has released this subscription service in “[the] United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Australia, New Zealand, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.” For a total of $3.99/month, users from these regions may access the aesthetically pleasing features that the service has to offer.
Creator Impact
Perhaps an overlooked question in this discussion is regarding the impact of Snapchat Plus on creators. Over 332 million people use Snapchat on a day-to-day basis to interact with not only their loved ones but influencers from across the globe. These personalities have the opportunity to share real-time updates on media releases, projects, and events that garner the attention of their audiences. Snapchat, then, is a major contributor to the success of influencers.
Snapchat Plus in itself, however, may be catering more to the individual than the influencer. But in that sentiment, it is clear that the subscription would allow fans across the globe to reach their favorite celebrities with ease. The feature of priority story replies would ensure that subscribers to Snapchat Plus would have the ability to be noticed more readily by whomever they choose to respond to.
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Snapchat Impact
Snapchat will obviously benefit from the release of Snapchat Plus. The company will see an increase in revenue as a result of this subscription, garnering $3.99 every month for each of its million subscribers.
Snapchat will also have the opportunity to test drive new features before releasing them to its full audience. A small percentage of their users will have the opportunity to beta test different features that will inevitably be rolled out to the remainder of users at a later date. This, at the moment, has been confirmed with Snapchat for web, according to snap.com.
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Takeaways
Snapchat is a vast network in the social media sphere, and new updates to its quickly growing and expanding interface should not be overlooked. Not only will the brand receive a substantial increase in income as a result of its new premium features, but it will no longer be forced to rely solely on its ad revenue to stay afloat. This could mean a number of things for the future of the app, granted the company seeks to change the way that ads are viewed.
Fans across the globe will have greater reach to communicate with influencers given the amenities that the subscription service Snapchat Plus has to offer. With the added feature of priority story replies, it will be difficult to be missed by one’s favorite influencers.
The most prevalent impact of Snapchat Plus, however, is in its aesthetic appeal. Users now have the chance to customize their app experience however they see most fitting. This includes both the ways that their lock screens appear and the way that the app is laid out upon opening the icon.
This article was written by Madeline Fait
