On The Podcast: Snapchat Really Is Planning To Take On TikTok

Subscribe to Planet Upload on Apple Podcasts, but we’re everywhere else, too. Just go to PlanetUploadPod.com.

Snapchat is getting more permanent.

The ephemeral camera-company-and-multimedia-messaging app is launching permanent public profiles and audience analytics to Snap’s 239 million daily active users around the globe. Previously these features were only available to the app’s verified creators (aka mostly public figures or influencers who already gained popularity on some other entertainment medium). Now Snapchat wants everyone to have a permanent destination in the application and the ability to see how their content performs.

Snapchat is already used by millions of Americans. It has 100 million U.S. daily active users and reaches 47 million-or-so 13 to 24-year-olds (which the company says is more than Facebook, Instagram, and Facebook Messenger combined). That’s a strong userbase with a lot of reach into a highly coveted demographic. If Snapchat can create an environment where those users continue to watch Snapchat’s Discover page, consume Snapchat Originals, and maintain their Snapstreaks, but also produce more shareable content because it’s now more easily discoverable – because they have permanent profiles where more people can more easily check out their stuff – it could transform the application into some serious competition for TikTok.

Couple this with the fact that Snapchat is reportedly testing a feature where users can share direct links to Snap Originals, videos from its Discover page, and celebrity clips for easy dissemination and consumption on other social networks and around the internet at large, and you have evidence of a clear plan from the once-private-and-temporary application that it wants to be more public and permanent.

You can hear me talk about all this and more in the latest installment of our new podcast, Planet Upload. Subscribe to Planet Upload on Apple Podcasts, but we’re everywhere else, too. Just go to PlanetUploadPod.com. The episode where I talk about all the above is also embedded below. I hope you dig it.