August was a very exciting month for the university’s Social Media Team; we launched our brand new Snapchat account! It had been on the cards for some time, and this month we finally have it up and running.

We are now on Snapchat! 👻 Click here to add us and see our first ever snapchat story: https://t.co/xJ5eULN2vu pic.twitter.com/iNrYOu7Kjc

— University of Surrey (@UniOfSurrey) August 4, 2016

Why Snapchat?

Snapchat is said to have over 150 million daily users, and it’s rising importance can be demonstrated in the chart below, showing that more than three in every five 18-24-year-old internet users now actively use the app, with use amongst older brackets also on the increase.

As a university, having a presence on Snapchat makes sense – it lets us showcase more authentic content, offering more ‘behind-the-scenes’ opportunities with a personal touch – there’s an expectation of less polished content on Snapchat.

What have we done with it so far?

Over the last month, we’ve had a lot of interesting opportunities to use Snapchat – for example, we carefully coincided the launch so that we had our account for A Level Results Day. So far, here’s just a few of the things we’ve covered;

• A tour of our wonderful hometown, Guildford
• Snapchat campus tour (with help from one of our amazing Student Ambassadors)
• Surrey Sports Park takeover, with a guest appearance by Olympic Swimmer Ben Proud
• 6 top tips for A Level Results Day

Looking to the future

After just one month, we’re nearing 1,000 Snapchat followers – it seems the wait definitely paid off! We’ve got a busy calendar and are keen to show off some behind-the-scenes and live elements of Surrey; we really have barely scratched the surface. A few of approaches we’re looking to try include;

• Student Ambassador takeovers; allowing followers a real insight into student life at Surrey
• Departmental takeovers. We’ve already had a fantastic Surrey Sports Park takeover, but we’re keen to have other teams and departments take over the account too!
• Event coverage: We’ll be covering all kinds of events on Snapchat; from Open Days and Graduations to building openings and Showcases.
• Behind-the-scenes: We’ll be taking users on tours of some of our amazing facilities (that you might not have known about)
• ‘5 minutes with’: We’re keen to showcase more of the wonderful people that make things happen at Surrey.

Have you added us on Snapchat yet?! You can find us here: https://t.co/o3cc9GDXtK 👻 pic.twitter.com/GQYlsuq9dJ

— University of Surrey (@UniOfSurrey) August 8, 2016