Snapchat has informed publishers such as Vice, IGN and CNN that use its ‘Discover’ feature that they intend to let their 100 million plus users subscribe to their channels to generate traffic to their platforms.
Currently, users have to switch to the Discover tab in the app to view content from those channels. As part of the new subscription feature, Snapchat also plans to replace each media brand’s circular logo with a magazine-like image that rotates each day depending on that publisher’s content in the hope to create a more visually appealing look.
According to Re/code the company, which is led by CEO Evan Spiegel, is planning to roll out the new feature in May though that may change.
Subscribing to a publisher’s channel will ensure that channel’s content appears on the app’s Stories page (where stories from people you’ve added on Snapchat are listed), a section of the app that’s easier to get to from the launch screen. Right now, Snapchat pushes a few Discover channels a day into the Stories page, but most of the 20+ publishers it works with remain listed on a separate page.
As of yet it is still unclear how the subscriptions will work, though it may be akin to a simple “follow”. Snapchat could also send push notifications to users who have subscribed to a publisher when something new has been posted.
Source: Re/code
