Snapchat unveils App stories

Snapchat has unveiled an App Stories feature giving users a chance to share their Snapchat Stories in other platforms and apps.

The multimedia messaging app now allows users to share stories they create on snapchat to platforms that have partnered with Snap while sharing the content only to those platforms, not with their friends on Snapchat.

App Stories that belong to the ‘Snap Kit’ platform that have given developers the leeway to use Snapchat’s login, Bitmoji, camera effects and now Stories. Snap says it has included 150 partner-app integrations via Snap Kit during the last quarter of 2019.

The initial partners to use the new product include video-calling app Squad, dating app Hilu, social video app Triller, and AR app Octi. While Tinder has been using Snapchat’s Bitmoji stickers it has not signed up for App Stories. These apps are using Snapchat Stories in slightly different ways on their platforms. For example, in Squad, users can co-watch Stories along in the screen-sharing option. App developers can choose to keep Stories live for up to seven days rather than the standard 24-hour limit.

App Stories makes it easy for third-party developers to include a Stories feature on their own platforms therefore bringing Snap’s content to more places, in particular to those who don’t already use Snapchat. This will potentially grow Snapchat’s user base and will also allow Snapchat to play a bigger role in Stories, a format that Snapchat created but has been adopted by many social media giants in their own versions since, such as Instagram and Facebook.

The launch of App Stories has now presented Snap with the opportunity to expand its advertising outside of its own app.

According to Ben Schwerin the Vice President of partnerships at Snap, App stories are a great platform for monetization but time wasn’t quite ripe.  Third-party apps won’t have ads for starters but Snap has announced plans to launch Ad Kit which will allow other apps to run Snap’s ads on their own platforms. While there is no launch date for Ad Kit yet, app developers can already request early access to Ad Kit.

As Snap continues to create more partnerships with other apps through App Stories, opportunities abound for advertisers.

www.snapchat.com