[Devolver]

Snap went from an incredible growth rate to a terrible growth rate because of a few simple (and sadly, quite common) strategic mistakes:

1. Underestimating the competition.

Evan Spiegel clearly believed that Zuckerberg would never figure out how to beat him. He seems to have concluded that he was smarter, more creative, and more agile than Zuck. He profoundly miscalculated Zuck's relentlessness and is now losing badly as a result.

Takeaway Lesson: Hubris kills.

2. Attacking a market where you have few/zero major advantages.

Evan seems to have concluded that the only scaleable way to monetize a social app is with digital advertising.

The problem?

With <10% of Facebook/Instagram's user base, a tiny fraction of Facebook's ad targeting data, and a set of ad products that were 4-5 years behind Facebooks, why would any advertiser ever dedicate more than their 1-5% "experimental" budget to Snapchat?

Answer: They wouldn't, and likely never will.

Takeaway lesson: Don't take a juggernaut head on. You will get crushed every time.

3. Misunderstanding your own advantages.

Snapchat originally took off because it offered an underserved segment of the market (young people) something Facebook and Instagram did not: a relatively safe, low-judgment place to express themselves.

By focusing on the advertising market (and inevitably turning to privacy-destroying data aggregators like Experian to buy ad targeting data on its users), Evan threw that away.

Takeaway lesson: Never lose sight of the needs and desires that led your users to choose you.

More here: https://exponents.co/snap-facebook-key-competitive-strategy/

[mrkurt]

I think the simpler explanation is: a social media monopoly replicated a smaller competitor's best features and let their dominance do the rest.

Let's not pretend it's possible to compete with Facebook on a level playing field.

[RandallBrown]

Facebook recreated snapchat mere months after it launched with an app called Poke. It was literally the exact same app, but people didn't use it.

It's more than just recreating the best feature.

[giobox]

I think most people think of "Instagram Stories" when discussing how Facebook copied Snapchat, rather than Poke.

In a very short amount of time Facebook where able to clone one of Snapchat's signature features AND gain large numbers of new users in the process (as of March 2017 they reported Instagram stories having 200 million users per day, overtaking Snapchat in the process).

[tqkxzugoaupvwqr]

Facebook replicated Snapchat’s story feature in all three of its major brands: Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp. Instagram is also relentless in adding new filters (filters people put on their face while recording themselves) and is Snapchat’s most fierce competitor from what I can tell.

[dsacco]

And then Facebook tried again last year and succeeded with Instagram Stories, passing SnapChat in users as of August: https://techcrunch.com/2017/08/02/instagram-stories-annivers...

[abalos]

As much as it pains me to say it, I stopped using Snapchat because my experience with Instagram Stories + Messaging in Instagram is simply better. Especially on Android.

The Snapchat Android app is completely garbage. :|

[aylmao]

I mean, yeah. A lot of startups could replicate Snapchat in that sense.

It's the market dominance that really did it. Instagram already had the attention, brand, and network.

[DrJid]

Then there's also SlingShot back in 2014. Which went nowhere

[SomeStupidPoint]

I think it's perfectly possible to compete with Facebook business to business (if you have SNAP levels of funding, at least).

You just can't beat them at being Facebook.

[lefstathiou]

I am fascinated by Facebook. It is one of the most valuable companies in the world but if you took it away from me (and I would argue most people) tomorrow morning it would have almost no impact on our day to day lives. I actively use it and my girlfriend is obsessed with Instagram but if she didnt have it she would just go back to reading blogs on Tumblr or wherever. I would hate to live in a world without Google or its ecosystem of applications (like Maps) or a world without Microsoft Excel/PowerPoint but I believe a world without Facebook would look almost identical to the world we have today.

[rock_hard]

I personally couldn’t disagree more.

If you cut me off tomorrow of Facebook and Messeneger I would instantly loose contact to the majority of people I care about (except my wife and parents).

I would end up spending life on my couch watching Netflix instead of engaging in a rich social life I have now thanks to FB events, groups, Messeneger, etc.

And I guarantee you that’s true for a large amount of the user base! Otherwise they wouldn’t retain.

(Fake) news and cat videos are a very hyped topic...but it’s really only a small part of why people actually use FB

[jsemrau]

That sounds really sad, to be honest. Where are you living that you can't have face to face interactions on a regular basis.

[wastedhours]

Adding passing acquaintances on Facebook has actually made them developing into real friends more likely by my anecdotal reckoning, as they're at the top of mind my when I see their updates and I remember to check in.

And my partner being friends with my mum on there has actually helped both out with subsequent interactions as they know more about their common ground.

Facebook, ultimately, is what you make it. There's loads of "racist uncles", "fake news", "Tasty videos" etc, but if you engage with the people, it's as powerful as ever.

[dagw]

Making new real friends as an adult in an entirely new place is really hard for many people in many places (including me), and hanging out with vague acquaintances doesn't hold much interest.

[speedplane]

Totally agree that it's challenging to make new friends as an adult. I feel lucky if I make one new real friend every two years. But just cause it's hard doesn't make it impossible, and it's far more rewarding than internet-only friends... you can actually do things together, not just talk.

[skc]

It's not sad, it's just different.

Culture has always changed with time.

[miranda_rights]

> Where are you living that you can't have face to face interactions on a regular basis.

Far from many of my friends and family? Many of them live in other states or countries, and Facebook is cheaper and usefully async when dealing with international calling rates and timezone differences, respectively. I'm not sure I understand your question.

[hkmurakami]

Many of them are abroad.

[gdulli]

People had social lives before Facebook. (source: I'm old enough to remember.)

[rock_hard]

Oh, I am old enough (40) to remember too...I am in fact old enough to know that I am much better of with FB in my life...minor annoyances asides (but no product is perfect in the end)

[enjo]

Really? It'd have a HUGE impact on my life.

Nearly every aspect of my social life is planned on Facebook. It's the one place where nearly everyone I know are. Facebook, for me, is really just the best event planning tool in existence.

I'd also instantly lose contact with a bunch of acquaintances and friends. I've moved around quite a bit in my life and Facebook connects me with those people. When I travel it's the platform I use to reach out to the people I want to catch-up with. It'd be a real bummer to lose that.

It's true that the news feed aspect of Facebook is something I wouldn't miss. It's something I never use anymore, politics has taken care of that. But all of the features around it ARE things I deeply care about.

[trhaynes]

I use a browser extension to display:none; the news feed section. I still get notifications (if I want to click the badge) and can browse/search, but don't get random content shoved in my face. It works well for me.

[richardknop]

I actually don't have phone numbers or email addresses for most of my friends. Without Messenger I wouldn't be able to communicate with them so that would be a huge disruption to me.

[siddharthdeswal]

I could agree with you even more than what I already do.

My social life is on WhatsApp groups. No one in my social circle uses Facebook Messenger for anything relevant. The number of friends' photos has steadily gone down over the years. I've switched off FB but come back when am bored and want to spend time looking at cat photos and BuzzFeed. Facebook not existing in the world would impact me minimally.

Google, and even Microsoft, on the other hand, damn if they stopped existing... I'd be fairly distressed I suppose.

[batiudrami]

I mean. Facebook owns Whatsapp. And if you're not in a WhatsApp country, the US, Korea, Japan or China, you're in a Facebook Messenger country. They handle messaging for the vast majority of the western world.

The Facebook website itself is no longer particularly useful to me, other than that it is very good at events (both private and for public event discovery). The groups feature is also handy.

[fwn]

Other than with Facebook's messenger, your WhatsApp social graph is in your phones addressbook. If Facebook's WhatsApp service were to be gone tomorrow you could just install the next biggest messenger and beyond minor initial fragmentation all your friends would still be there.

This wouldn't work with the Facebook Messenger, since this social graph is not stored by the user.

[dingo_bat]

WhatsApp is basically how me, my family and friends text, call or video chat.

[tanilama]

Messenger is huge. It is like utility that I won't even assume it is going away.

[willitpamp573]

You don't run a business, I can tell.

[marcell]

From the article:

> But it did not work with Snapchat and Evan Spiegel, who seems to have turned down Facebook’s $3,000,000,000 without hesitation or second thought.

I think it did work out pretty well for Evan Spiegel and Snap Inc., since they're trading at around $18B on the stock market despite lots of concerns around their business...

[brianwawok]

You are comparing 3 billion cash in pocket vs 18 billion paper money. How much stock has he sold so far?

[nrhk]

He's made more than he would've gotten. Insiders sold way ahead of the game, though not all their shares.

[milkshakes]

closer to $16B in after hours action, who knows what tomorrow will bring?

[immad]

You make it sound like Snap is a failure.

It is worth $16b even after the affect of this earnings report.

Facebook might have slowed their growth but they did make a huge company before they were slowed down.

[blackflame7000]

But what is Snap really worth? They don't have assets and don't make a product but rather provide a service. A service is only as valuable as the number of people who use it. If Facebook continues to steal users away from Snap at the current rate, it will go they way of myspace before long.

[immad]

Its a liquid stock with volume of $10m+/day. It seems like its worth what other people are willing to pay for it.

[blackflame7000]

Very true, but just like bitcoin was once 5$ and now 5000$ nothing of substance is preventing it from returning to 5$ once again other than "investors" (more like speculators). As Rupert Murdoch learned the hard way, what was worth 580 Million in 2005 was worth $35 Million by 2011 once the users left.