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How Snapchat Built a Business by Confusing Olds

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Re: How Snapchat Built a Business by Confusing Olds

#41

Post by dboreham »

dinkumthinkum wrote: post #29
yomly wrote: post #10

For the non-believers of Snapchat, here is where I think its value lies: For the past 50 years brand strategy has largely been (fairly) well characterised. Conventional wisdom in the industry did well enough for brands like McDonald's and Coca Cola to expand across the world and capture generations of customers. This is in part due to an incremental pace of innovation in how customers have consumed media in this time…

Is there any real evidence that these kids don't watch any tv and only do snapchat and watch makeup gurus on YouTube? I know it's fun to say but I mean what about reality? ....

Evidence in our house, yes. The TV delivery industry shot their feet off in this area because they have a pricing model where they want to charge per "screen" (we use Echostar, but I believe the other providers have similar pricing). They also insist (or did until yesterday) that the data gets to the screen by coax. My two kids have tv screens in their bedrooms but I was not interested in paying an extra fee to have the signal delivered to them, nor was I keen to crawl around under the floor pulling coax (they have perfectly fine GigE connections already). They could in theory watch TV on a screen in the family room but they'd need to fight someone else for control of the set top box (and get out of bed). The result is they spend all day watching YouTube and Snapchatting on their phones. The TVs are only used for Netflix.

Re: How Snapchat Built a Business by Confusing Olds

#42

Post by w1ntermute »

narrowrail wrote: post #30
yomly wrote: post #10

For the non-believers of Snapchat, here is where I think its value lies: For the past 50 years brand strategy has largely been (fairly) well characterised. Conventional wisdom in the industry did well enough for brands like McDonald's and Coca Cola to expand across the world and capture generations of customers. This is in part due to an incremental pace of innovation in how customers have consumed media in this time…

>here is where I think its value lies: I don't think the users (whatever their age) of Snapchat find value because of the advertisers; that seems to reverse cause and effect.

He's referring to the value to shareholders, not to users. It's already apparent to everyone that there's value for users - there's an enormous number of them spending a ton of time in the app.

Re: How Snapchat Built a Business by Confusing Olds

#43

Post by samcodes »

lotso wrote: post #15
nightski wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's far more likely that Snapchat is a very shallow experience. It's common sense that adults wouldn't be the target market. Adults generally prefer richer interactions.

I think you may be unfamiliar with Snapchat because Snapchat has some of the richest of interactions of any messaging or social network. You're literally communicating to your friends with videos and photos. The only thing that could be better than that is being in person. For some users, they're sending Snaps to dozens of friends every day, that they wouldn't otherwise talk to. It makes texting/email/fb feel so bori…

Thank you; this is the comment I was looking for. Someone who uses and appreciates Snapchat and can explain to an outsider what the value is. Am I wrong in saying that you like that it feels more authentic?

Re: How Snapchat Built a Business by Confusing Olds

#44

Post by stephenboyd »

zerocrates wrote: post #5
macscam wrote: post #2

what is 'olds'? old people? Why would any business grow by confusing them?

Compared with Twitter or Facebook, Snapchat can seem almost aggressively user-unfriendly. If you’re new to the app and looking for posts by your kid, your boyfriend, or DJ Khaled, good luck. It’s hard to find somebody without knowing his or her screen name. This is by design. “We’ve made it very hard for parents to embarrass their children,” Spiegel said at a conference in January. “It’s much more for sharing persona…

This part of the claim doesn't hold up. The first thing that happens when you sign up is it will show you the username of everyone with a phone number in your contact list, including your embarrassed kids, and let you start following them right away.

Re: How Snapchat Built a Business by Confusing Olds

#45

Post by dinkumthinkum »

nl wrote: post #36
dinkumthinkum wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there any real evidence that these kids don't watch any tv and only do snapchat and watch makeup gurus on YouTube? I know it's fun to say but I mean what about reality? ....

Yes. http://nypost.com/2015/02/16/millenials-ditching-their-tv-se...

This appears to be the wrong link or doesn't really support the claim at all.

It says "usage is down for 18-34 year olds" so 18-34 year olds are not kids, not like 14 year olds. And saying it is down is very different from saying "kids don't watch TV, they use snapchat, therefore brands like Coca Cola are irrelevant."

This is what I'm saying. There is this unthinking, uncritical, and unskeptical self-congratulatory sort of "ding dong the witch is dead" about anything related to "traditional media" and the reason for this is "because Internet" or something like that. But, I think it is a very naive view and is fun to say but it's not actually real.

I mean, this article is an example of just weak evidence. Again, it is not about kids but its about the 18-34 demographic. But let's see, it says:

"In 2011, 21.7 million young adults tuned in to their TV sets. By the end of last month, that figure had fallen to 17.8 million, according to Nielsen figures."

OK, whatever that means, let's just accept the numbers as they are presented. Just elementary math tells us 17/21 is hardly nothing or "no one is watching" anymore.

Now, the article cited, to support this claim, says:

"In the era of smartphones and Netflix, it’s no surprise that traditional TV is losing relevance for younger viewers."

Wait ... so instead of watching actual TV sets with bunny ears, they are watching things like Netflix (which I understand is much different than Snapchat) .... OK, let's peruse the content of Netflix .... OK, wait a minute, all this content on Netflix looks familiar ....

Do you mean to tell me all this stuff on Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon are mostly .... from the TV? With the exception of a handful of originals, which honestly are produced in a similar way as the TV, most of this stuff coming from the evil "dead witch," the TV. I don't find a lot of "Vine Comps" on Netflix. Also, on some level it seems silly to me to point to Netflix and Amazon as evidence that these other things are dead; it's not like Amazon Originals are like "The-New-Internet-Meme.com" they are much more like "In addition HBO, Showtime, Starz and Cinemax there Amazon and Netflix" than some totally fundamental shift in the kind of content consumed ... whether it is over bunny ears or choppy wifi is sort of an implementation detail to some extent than a cultural revolution.

If one wants to say "People don't watch TV anymore" and then what they really mean is "They watch ABC shows on the ABC App on the iPad instead" .... Then claims like the "The Coca Cola brand is dead because Snapchat" seem to lose their luster.

I hate to "disrupt" the groupthink. :)

Re: How Snapchat Built a Business by Confusing Olds

#46

Post by dinkumthinkum »

dboreham wrote: post #41
dinkumthinkum wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there any real evidence that these kids don't watch any tv and only do snapchat and watch makeup gurus on YouTube? I know it's fun to say but I mean what about reality? ....

Evidence in our house, yes. The TV delivery industry shot their feet off in this area because they have a pricing model where they want to charge per "screen" (we use Echostar, but I believe the other providers have similar pricing). They also insist (or did until yesterday) that the data gets to the screen by coax. My two kids have tv screens in their bedrooms but I was not interested in paying an extra fee to have…

OK, but you know what they say about anecdotes, right? I'm sure there are many people on HN that have never watched a show in their entire life; there is an Onion article about "Area Man Constantly Telling People He doesn't Own a TV" [1]. Also, there is a group of people in America I understand called the Amish. That's fine but I'm not sure how to generalize from that .... My response is to this kind of often repeated idea that I think lacks a lot of merit or evidence in reality. For that view to be true, there better be a statistically insignificant number of kids that have ever seen any of these shows or any of their associated advertisments because they are too busy with Snapchat.

One thing I am aware of is that kids have a lot of free time and they do a lot of different things, is what I understand.

1. http://www.theonion.com/article/area-man-constantly-mentioni...

Re: How Snapchat Built a Business by Confusing Olds

#47

Post by [deleted] »

Can_Not wrote: post #25
oldmanjay wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you seriously doubting the premise that people mature as they get older? Biology bestowed the high horse here. I don't mean this as dismissively as it may sound, but it seems possible you'll figure this out in a personal sense over the coming years.

> Are you seriously doubting the premise that people mature as they get older? I do. Biologically? Maybe. Mentally? I doubt it a lot. I know lots of people of all ages who use Facebook for the most vapid, shallow, and empty experiences. Socially or not.

[deleted]

Re: How Snapchat Built a Business by Confusing Olds

#48

Post by nl »

dinkumthinkum wrote: post #45
nl wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. http://nypost.com/2015/02/16/millenials-ditching-their-tv-se...

This appears to be the wrong link or doesn't really support the claim at all. It says "usage is down for 18-34 year olds" so 18-34 year olds are not kids, not like 14 year olds. And saying it is down is very different from saying "kids don't watch TV, they use snapchat, therefore brands like Coca Cola are irrelevant." This is what I'm saying. There is this unthinking, uncritical, and unskeptical self-congratulatory s…

Sure. I apologize.

these kids don't watch any tv

I assumed that you'd be able to extrapolate the behavior of the 18-34 year olds to younger people, and I assumed that you didn't mean any literally.

Of "youth" (13-24 year olds)[1]:

96% watch online video ("Youtube and similar, social media") for an average of 11.3 hours per week.

71% watch online subscription services (Netflix etc) for an average of 10.8 hours a week

57% watch free online TV services (amctv.com, ABC app etc), average of 6.4 hours a week

81% watch scheduled TV, average 8.3 hours a week

56% watch catchup or recorded TV, average of 7.5 hours a week.

Additionally, "The five most influential figures among Americans ages 13-18 are all YouTube creators"[2]

I'm not sure if this supports or doesn't support your arguments. I know I sure don't agree with the claim "The Coca Cola brand is dead because Snapchat". I didn't really understand the argument there at all.

[1] http://sandbox.break.com/acumen/Acumen%20Constant%20Content_...

[2] http://variety.com/2014/digital/news/survey-youtube-stars-mo...

Re: How Snapchat Built a Business by Confusing Olds

#49

Post by grrowl »

stephenboyd wrote: post #44
zerocrates wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Compared with Twitter or Facebook, Snapchat can seem almost aggressively user-unfriendly. If you’re new to the app and looking for posts by your kid, your boyfriend, or DJ Khaled, good luck. It’s hard to find somebody without knowing his or her screen name. This is by design. “We’ve made it very hard for parents to embarrass their children,” Spiegel said at a conference in January. “It’s much more for sharing persona…

This part of the claim doesn't hold up. The first thing that happens when you sign up is it will show you the username of everyone with a phone number in your contact list, including your embarrassed kids, and let you start following them right away.

It's only useful if their "Who can view my story" setting is "Everyone". If it's set to "My Friends" you must send a friend request and they must accept it. There's also "Custom" so you can specifically block cooldad1969 or pick a subset of friends. Similar deal for "Who can send me snaps" — settings are "Everyone" or "My Friends".

edit: I guess this is a good example — without deep familiarity with the app you could assume they don't post to their Story if it's empty, or could believe that snaps received in the message view (not the main list) were recently taken (those have been sent from the camera roll)

Re: How Snapchat Built a Business by Confusing Olds

#50

Post by askafriend »

at-fates-hands wrote: post #37
arbuge wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> I chose McDonald's and Coke as brands as they are two good examples of previously invincible global brands that are now showing significant decline. Not sure about Coke but McDonald's is doing pretty well these days. Its stock recently hit an all-time high and is one of the best performers this year, following their success with all-day breakfast.

Coke is doing just fine. I travel a LOT and I would say Coke is the preferred brand in probably 85% of the hotels and restaurants I visit. I still bring along a 12-pack of Mt. Dew because so many places only have Coke products and its frustrating to have to drink flat fountain coke.

Soda is insanely bad for you, why do you drink so much of it that you're lugging around 12-packs with you?

I'm genuinely curious, no judgement.

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