Want 2020 to be the year that your business’ Snapchat account finally takes off? Keep reading to learn more about how to grow your Snapchat following faster than ever before.

Why businesses should use Snapchat

The most important and apparent reason that businesses should use Snapchat is the platform’s popularity. It may be the underdog of social media when compared to sites like Facebook and Instagram, but it still holds its own against older competitors.

In 2014, just three years after Snapchat's debut, the platform started Q1 with 46 million daily users. By the end of Q3 of 2019, that user base had grown to more than 210 million daily users.

Not only is that a broad audience for your brand to engage with, but it's also a vital demographic. According to research by ComScore in 2018, 71% of Snapchats users are under 34 years old, and 45% are between 18 and 24 years of age. If that age group makes up any part of your desired demographic, then ignoring Snapchat is a serious mistake.

9 tips for getting more Snapchat followers in 2020

1. Cross-promote your Snapchat

A solid way to grow your Snapchat followers is to cross-promote your Snapchat on other social media accounts. There are a couple of different ways to do this.

The first is to link directly to your Snapchat account in the bio of your other accounts, which makes finding your account super easy. Alternatively, you can share your Snapchat username in these bios, which allows people to search for your account on Snapchat.

Once you've pasted the link in the bios of your various accounts, you can periodically promote your Snapchat in posts on other social media sites. The best way to do this is by sharing your Snapchat stories on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.

2. Share your Snapchat with your mailing list

Following the same track, let's talk about sharing your Snapchat with your mailing list followers. This isn't always as effective as sharing your Snapchat on social media as your mailing list readers aren't always avid users of social media. It's still the second-best place to share your Snapchat account, though.

Just like on pages of your website, you should have a fixed link to your Snapchat account in every email you send to your mailing list. This can be at the bottom of the email with the rest of your social media accounts. You may want to use certain emails to explicitly promote your Snapchat, in which case you’ll want to have links to it throughout the message. These types of promotion emails work best when you first launch your account.

3. Use your Snapcode everywhere

QR codes never caught on as expected, but Snapcodes have. Snapcodes are those yellow squares with a white ghost in the middle surrounded by little black dots.

Like QR codes, the black dots make up a unique pattern tied to your account. Anyone who views your Snapcode through the Snapchat viewfinder will be redirected to your profile. You can even scan Snapcodes from pictures and screenshots on a smartphone.

Because Snapcodes are already so accessible and easy to use, you should take advantage of them! Add your Snapcode to your social accounts periodically, use it as your profile picture on Twitter and Facebook, print it on your product packaging, and include it in ads and posters.

4. Host contests, games, and giveaways

Because Snapchat's users are young, they respond to events like contests, games, and giveaways with much more enthusiasm than users on other platforms. That makes these tools one of the best ways to boost your Snapchat followers.

The most important thing to remember when hosting these kinds of events on your Snapchat is to make them fun. You want to use them to promote your business in some way, but not so overtly that you're unable to create audience interest.

Aside from engaging your followers and encouraging others to start following you on Snapchat, an event like this will also tell you the engagement rates from your followers. Aim to get at least 10% of your followers to respond in some way to your event.

5. Use Snapchat Insights to find your demographic

A tool that professional Snapchat users have that regular users don’t is Snapchat Insights. Insights is a set of analytical tools that will help you better understand the demographics of your followers through statistics like:

• Your viewers' age, location, gender, and interests
• Your viewers' attention span (how much time they spend watching your content)
• The number of viewers you have over a specific period

These analytics help you visualize your Snapchat audience and market directly to them. In turn, you spend less time throwing darts at the wall. You can also use this as a metric to see if you’re accomplishing your goals. If you want to market your service to young adults but are only engaging with middle-aged adults, then you know you need to adjust your strategy.

6. Use Snapchat ads

Like any other social media platform, Snapchat has its advertising tools that you can take advantage of, and they’re surprisingly affordable! You don’t have to have the world’s largest marketing budget to reach prospective followers on Snapchat.

The major advantage of Snapchat ads is that they use the most engaging form of advertising out there: video and audio clips. You can capture the attention of thousands of potential customers in just 10 seconds.

When creating a Snapchat ad, remember to keep things lighthearted and fun. Snapchat is a platform where relatability and silliness thrive. A 10-second clip discussing student loans and divorce rates probably belongs somewhere else.

7. Know when to post

Though knowing when to post isn't nearly as important as what you're posting, it's still important to consider. Because of the temporary nature of Snapchat posts, posting at the wrong time can result in your post coming and going without ever gaining any traction.

Since Snapchat has an overwhelmingly young user base, the best time to post is between 10 pm and 1 am. That's when most of Snapchat's users are going to be casually browsing the app while trying to fall asleep.

As of now, it doesn't look like any particular day of the week is a better time to post than any other day. Again, though, we want to emphasize that timing your posts alone won't grow your Snapchat followers. You need to post engaging content first and foremost.

8. Look for trending topics

This may seem like a bandwagon approach, and it is. On social media, though, jumping on the bandwagon tends to work. Chasing trends on Snapchat is a lot like using trending hashtags on Twitter. It's a great way to divert some of that traffic to your social media.

On Snapchat, however, the trending topics aren't as visible. Instead, you're going to have to pay attention to the platform and pick up on trends as they happen. It's a skill social media influencers have perfected and something you should pick up on with time.

If you want a retrospective look at what trended on Snapchat last month, visit Snapchat's official blog. At the end of every month, they post a blog revisiting the most popular topics on the platform from the previous month.

9. Create your own geofilters

Tip #9 is to create original geofilters. We've included this last not because it's unimportant, but because it might not be the right fit for every business. Geofilters are Snapchat filters (the special effects on Snapchat used to warp your face and photos) created by companies.

They're "geo"-filters because they only work when people are within a specified distance from the creator. So if you're a global company, geofilters might not be right for your brand. But if you're a local company looking for some fun, grassroots-style marketing, geofilters are a great way to go.

One of the best parts about geofilters is that they're affordable. Depending on how far you want your geofilter to reach, you can pay as little as $5.

How NOT to gain more Snapchat followers

So far, we've talked about everything you can do right to grow your Snapchat followers. To close, we want to address the things you might think about doing, but shouldn’t.

Don't add Snapchat users

First up, don't add Snapchat users. That may sound odd, since following Snapchatters would seemingly be a good way to get their attention. Although it will get their attention, it probably won't get it in the way you want.

Following Snapchat users from a corporate account can give off the impression of being out of touch at best and creepy at worst. You want to present yourself as a fun business, not as an entity that’s desperately seeking out prospective customers. Unless you have some sort of meaningful history with the person you want to follow, it’s best to forego following altogether.

Don't post the same thing every day

This tip may sound obvious, but businesses often do this without realizing it. If all of your Snapchat posts follow the same structure using different words and images, then you're posting the same thing each day.

It's fine to have filler content; it's inevitable. But you should never become so complacent that your Snapchat becomes only filler. Make sure that every few posts show off some type of creativity and engage your Snapchat followers in a new and exciting way.

Don't post long Snapchat stories

The average Snapchat user is on the platform for 33 minutes a day in approximately two-minute chunks. You need to create an account that can hold their attention amidst responding to their friends, editing and posting their own stories, and browsing other content.

A five-minute Snapchat story is highly unlikely to get you the kind of interactions you’re after. Instead, focus on the information you want to convey in each of your stories and try to get it across in 15 seconds or less.

Grow your Snapchat followers in 2020

Snapchat may seem like a difficult platform to grow a following on. Still, just like any other social media endeavor, the trick is making quality content, paying attention to your audience, and being patient.

For more tips on raising your brand awareness and online presence, check out the rest of our resources.