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TikTok Faces a New Rival Feature from Snapchat: Why We Care

Snapchat has recently launched Spotlight – a new feature which displays the best Snaps in a news feed which looks surprisingly similar to that of their rival, TikTok.

The new feature comes with a bonus – a literal, financial bonus – for those who get the opportunity to be featured on Spotlight. Creators older than 16 can reportedly earn a share of over $1 million distributed by Snapchat once their content is displayed on the new feature.

Right now, Spotlight is available in the US, the UK, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Ireland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Germany and France.

 

How it works

When you tap the Spotlight icon on the Snapchat app, the feature will start showing snaps in an endless scrolling mode. Each snap is selected by an algorithm and it basically displays what the algorithm thinks you might like. The choice of snaps is based on your general activity on Snapchat, including which videos you’ve watched and for how long.

Although Spotlight is oddly similar to giant rival TikTok, it also has a few small differences. Firstly, users can post videos on Spotlight while their Snapchat profile remains private. Secondly, Spotlight snaps don’t have a public comments section, unlike TikTok.

As I’ve mentioned above, Snapchat creators give Spotlight users the possibility of making extra cash depending on their post reach. More precisely, the team promises to share $1 million daily to ‘Snapchatters who create the top Snaps on Spotlight.’ It’s still unclear how many Snapchatters will submit content to this feature or how the money will be divided, but we’ll see soon enough.

To become eligible, users have to do is post a snap on the feature and wait for reactions; those who have earned money will get a direct message from Team Snapchat.

 

Why it matters

The launch of Spotlight arrived shortly after TikTok announced that Charli D’amelio is the first creator who has 100 million followers on the social platform. Up until now, Snapchat didn’t have any feature or program designed to discover talented creators.

Launching Spotlight is a sign that Snapchat might change its direction and other features as well. This is mainly because this new feature is very similar to TikTok, since it allows you to swipe up through videos in a news feed. As a plus, the opportunity of financial gains may convince more creators to turn to Snapchat instead of similar social media platforms.

The new feature is an open door to reach out to potential customers; much like any other advertising strategy, though, your content should be creative and engaging. However, many content creators have enjoyed plenty of success with homemade videos, so even if you’re a startup, you can still come up with creative ways of promoting your services.

Right now, we still don’t know how successful this new feature will be; as a personal opinion, I’m a bit reluctant towards the idea that Snapchat will grow bigger than TikTok, since the latter has taken the world by storm this year. However, with less competition, come greater chances of standing out from the crowd.

 

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