Why 'Snapchat stars' love Instagram's new copycat product
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When Facebook-owned Instagram announced a product earlier this week that bears a striking resemblance to Snapchat Stories, many users rolled their eyes.
But there's a surprising group of people who are particularly excited about the new development: Snapchat stars.
Like Vine, YouTube, and Instagram, Snapchat has a group of mega-popular, homegrown stars who make big bucks by working with brands. They'll do account takeovers for companies like Burger King or Walmart, or get paid to create original, sponsored content on their own feeds.
But Snapchat doesn't make life easy for creators. The app doesn't have a user suggestion page or an easy way to share snaps, so it's difficult for stars to grow their audiences or go viral in the typical sense.
Instagram, however, has a "discovery" portal that features regular users instead of just publishers and events, as well as a more straightforward search interface. Plus, more brands are already using it.
For the handful of Snapchat stars Business Insider talked to, Instagram's copycat Stories product looks so far like a big, potentially lucrative opportunity that they can't wait to start toying with.
Why they're excited
Right now, Mike Platco has about 10,000 followers on Instagram, a trivial number compared with the audience of about 300,000 he has amassed on Snapchat thanks to his creative drawings and goofy antics.
But now that he can bring his Snapchat charm to Instagram Stories, he's excited to start trying to build that audience — while hopefully porting over the kind of clients he already works with. He thinks Instagram's similarities will be an advantage: He already specializes in creating content in the nonstatic, creative vertical-video format that he thinks brands will be looking for.
"I'm really excited to start experimenting with it to see if it has the legs to be another great spot for cool stuff to live," he said.
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Branden Harvey agrees and says he's already starting to talk to his Snapchat clients about Instagram Stories. Instagram has many more users (brands and people alike) than Snapchat — ~300 million daily active users versus about 150 million daily active users.
Harvey doesn't expect to stop creating Snapchat Stories, but he thinks Instagram's new product could affect the amount of new "influencers" joining.
"I've had a few friends who are influencers who were thinking of jumping onto Snapchat who texted me and said, 'Whelp, now I don't have to join,'" he said. "I don't think brands or influencers with existing platforms on Snapchat will abandon ship, but I think people who were on the edge about joining Snapchat will think, 'We don't need a presence here.'"
Cyrene Quiamco, who quit her job last fall to focus on Snapchat full time, says her frustration with the app's lack of a way for users to discover her has her eyeing Instagram eagerly. She's not planning to abandon Snapchat, but if Instagram caters more to creators — who knows?
"It's all up for grabs," she says. "I'm up for grabs."
Nick Cicero, the CEO of creator-network company Delmondo, says brands he has talked to so far are into it. Many will still want to chase the specific audience that Snapchat has more ownership over, but there are a lot of advantages to trying the same kind of content on Instagram.
"Instagram has a much more defined ad tool, audience data, analytics, and API," he said. "There are a lot of brands that have already grown really large Instagram audiences. Now they can turn on Stories and create that same live-ish content."
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