Young Users May Not Save Snapchat
What is the future for Snapchat? The youngest app in the social media circus is popular with young users, but mixed reports this month lead to some serious questions as it fights to assert itself amongst the old timers like Facebook and Twitter.
The good news was that a report last week confirmed Snapchat as the social media of choice for younger people.
Apparently, they prefer it because relatives cannot see their postings.
Those who use Facebook as well tend to present a sanitised version of their lives there.
That report focused particularly on a specific demographic, the 18 to 24 year olds, and arrived at predications that, amongst them, Snapchat will take over Facebook by the end of the year.
In that age group, market projections show a healthy growth of Snapchat users, whilst Facebook usage shrinks.
However, another report, two weeks earlier, showed that Snapchat lost three million users across all age groups during the second quarter of this year. Admittedly, that is just three of almost two hundred millions, but it was still an unexpected reversal.
Snapchat’s major problem, though, is economic survival.
The age group with which it has most popularity does not own so many homes or cars or have so much disposable income, and advertisers are not flocking to it.
Yet another report this month showed that for every user of Facebook on an average day the company clocks up about seven pounds worth of advertising revenue.
The equivalent figure for Snapchat is about one pound.
That may explain why Snapchat has yet to generate a profit.
It may be popular with the young, but it may also be short-lived.
