The D2Z Podcast
Gen Z entrepreneur and DTC agency leader Brandon Amoroso talks with some of the best in the marketing world. Brandon and guests reveal their top business-growth strategies for anyone in the online space–whether you are a brick-and-mortar business looking to scale or an established online business trying to grow. Consumer marketing is under constant and dramatic change, so Brandon aims to tackle new problems with a fresh Gen Z mindset. The D2Z Podcast delivers insights, strategies, and tactics that you can use and aims to shift how you think about business and your relationships with your teams, partners, and customers.
The D2Z Podcast
Unlocking Snapchat's Potential for Brands - 144
In this episode of The D2Z Podcast, Brandon Amoroso speaks with Collin Harrington and Hope Georgiou, co-founders of HG Media, about their entrepreneurial journey and the unique challenges they faced in the digital marketing landscape. They discuss the importance of Snapchat as a marketing platform, the impact of the TikTok ban on brand strategies, and how brands can effectively engage with audiences on Snapchat. The conversation highlights the significance of community building, authenticity, and the evolving nature of social media marketing.
Here's What You'll Learn:
❗Hope and Colin's journey led to the creation of HG Media.
❗Snapchat's unique positioning offers opportunities in a saturated market.
❗Educating brands about Snapchat is crucial for success.
❗Younger entrepreneurs face challenges in building credibility.
❗Communicating a vision is essential in marketing.
❗Brands should not assume their target audience.
❗Snapchat is effective for conversion-focused marketing.
❗Non-consumer brands can leverage Snapchat for engagement.
❗Smaller creators often have more engaged audiences.
❗The future of Snapchat depends on knowledge and accessibility.
Timestamps:
00:00 Introduction to HG Media and Founders' Journey
02:20 Challenges of Starting a Business in Digital Marketing
10:04 The Impact of TikTok Ban on Marketing Strategies
14:09 Identifying Brands That Thrive on Snapchat
18:14 Utilizing Snapchat for Non-Consumer Brands
24:07 Building Community and Authenticity on Snapchat
HG Media:
Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/company/hg-media-group-llc/
HG Media - https://www.hgmedia.us/about
Brandon Amoroso:
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/brandonamoroso/
Web - https://brandonamoroso.com/
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/bamoroso11/
X - https://twitter.com/AmorosoBrandon
Scalis.ai - https://scalis.ai/
Hey everyone, thanks for tuning into D2Z, a podcast about using the Gen Z mindset to grow your business. I'm Gen Z entrepreneur Brandon Almaroso, the former founder of Electric and now co-founder of Scaleless. Today I'm talking with Colin and Hope, who are the co-founders of HD Media Group, which is a digital marketing firm with a talent management division. Thanks for coming on the show.
Speaker 2:Thank you for having us. We're super excited.
Speaker 1:So, before we dive into things here, are you both able to give a quick background on your own entrepreneurial journey and how you got to HG Media?
Speaker 3:Sure thing, Hope, I'll let you take it away Absolutely Very excited to be here, Excited to talk to you today, Brandon, and just kind of share our journey honestly, in the hopes that it helps other people, inspires other people. I think that's a really big reason on you know why we do this and the core value of our company. But yeah, my name is Hope Georgiou. I'm the founder of HG Media.
Speaker 3:We are on actually our second year now of the company and it's been such a great journey. I actually met Colin through our previous job and I think when we were working together we really realized our styles of work was very synergistic between each other. He had a really great specialty in creators. I've always had a focus on the brand side of things and marketing and we really decided to come together and say, hey, I think there is a gap in the market here and maybe we should take that jump and start our own thing.
Speaker 3:And that's kind of when HG Media was born, so you already kind of introed it perfectly. We're a digital marketing agency. We focus on everything digital and also events with our brand clients. But when we started this company, it was really focused around Snapchat, which was our unique positioning going into the market and really just breaking into a saturated industry because a lot of people are doing talent, a lot of people are in the marketing space and everyone's on digital. So it's how do you make that different for your brand clients? So I think, from meeting Colin and really you know, finding a collaborative way in which we can work together and then making that jump to start our own thing and finding that gap in the market, that was something really important to us and that's kind of where HGNP was born.
Speaker 1:But yeah, yeah, what have been some of the, I guess, unexpected gotchas or things that you maybe were not prepared for when you decided to go off on your own and start your own entrepreneurial venture?
Speaker 2:around Snapchat. Like Hope said, our unique positioning when we first started out was really breaking into the market about Snapchat, snapchat branded content, snapchat creators, paid media, you know IRL activations and to my knowledge, it's like everyone knows Snapchat but, from a marketing influencer stance, absolutely no one knows Snapchat. So that was something that we really had to break through. In our industry and you know, the creator economy is very small. A lot of people talk, everyone knows each other and you know you have these massive brands always investing in tiktok or instagram, youtube, you know, etc.
Speaker 2:And I just think it's a huge and there is a huge knowledge gap when it comes to snapchat, of there's creators on the platform or you know, it's just for 13 year olds. You know, there's just a lot of stigmas to be solved, and so I think for the first year, that was definitely a challenge that we had regarding and just informing brands. Listen, there's a different opportunity here. You know the saturated red ocean that you and your competitors are exploring. It may work for the time being, but we really need to open your eyes to the you know, bright blue water that is Snapchat. And so definitely for the first year, it was just informing brands, getting them on board with the you know power of Snapchat and the capabilities overall. But other than that, I would not say that there have been many other challenges transparently.
Speaker 1:Sorry, go ahead. Did you have any gotchas yeah?
Speaker 3:I think there's a lot of different aspects to it.
Speaker 3:I think on the Snapchat piece, colin answered it perfectly Like there is just so much education that goes with that. I think, with being founders and being young founders and being in the industry, I think there's its own set of challenges with that and building credibility and building your clientele and facing those hurdles of when people tell you something might be a dumb idea, but maybe you have a vision for it that they might not be able to see yet. So I think the hardest part and whatever industry that you're in and anyone who starts a business it's communicating. That vision is so important, but it's also the hardest, because anytime you're in marketing or sales or asking people to spend money with a service that you're able to provide, it's already going to be 10 times harder. People they don't want to spend money, so you have to really really give them a reason and a value add on how far their dollar is going to take them yeah, I remember, uh, one of my my previous business was a Shopify Plus agency and we were all super young.
Speaker 1:I'm pretty sure most of the single team member was over 30. And that was pretty obvious from the website. You know, my dog's face was our cursor on the website, like the little emoji icon of her, and I remember getting a. We had like our HubSpot CRM, so we had the live chat that would just ping me on Slack wherever I was and somebody just like ripped us apart about having the dog cursor there and I was like this is honestly a great self-selection process because I don't want to work with you anyways. So this was awesome.
Speaker 1:You know 99% of other people were like wow, this is great, you know, so fun. And like you know you're not working with us because we have 30 years of experience. But also, why would you want to work with somebody who has 30 years of experience in like email marketing? Because there wasn't even email, I don't think 30 years ago, even alive 30 years ago. But I'd rather work with the person who's been you know who's in email right now, with the most modern tools, up to date on the most current trends, and so just like leaning into you know who you are, versus trying to shy away from it, because I think a lot of the advice that you get from external sources is to try, and you know, make your company look like it's like 500 people or that you have like offices around the world. They're, you're super corporate and buttoned up, and you know that's. That's just wasn't, the wasn't the way that we were gonna be able to be successful I agree completely.
Speaker 2:I think too and it's a really interesting position that hope and I have found ourselves in of you know, the people who boast about having the 10, 15 years of experience in social where it's like did you, are you really? Or I don't know? To me, when someone calls themselves an expert, it's like for us, we're constantly learning. I think social is an industry where it literally is changing. You know, quarterly, monthly is what it feels like. Trends are popping up, platforms are emerging.
Speaker 2:You know from the depths when it comes to LinkedIn, creator marketing or Pinterest or Snapchat, and I think to me and a big selling point was seeing you know, just execs, like you said, it's like, oh, I am coming over from traditional, but digital is completely different, the landscape is completely different and I think you know it's definitely a learning lesson. But, to your point, the younger people who have grown up in the digital world, who really know the trends, know what platforms are emerging, which ones are staying, which ones are iffy about. I definitely think that quote unquote younger generation has that advantage. So definitely excited to continue that. You know, stat. So definitely excited to continue that, you know, stat.
Speaker 1:I think they need to rework the generations, because I'm technically Gen Z, but like if you went to the youngest Gen Z that are out there, we could not be more different. I don't even know how to talk to them. Like it's like different worlds that we're living in.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I took the gen alphas now or something too, I don't know. But once again, I mean, I think, leaning back into the Snapchat angle. Snapchat it's virtually, you know, known for being oh, young, skewing demographic. Where, in reality, is the demographic like 21 to 30.
Speaker 2:Yes, that statistically is proven through Snapchat, but a lot of people do have the misconception that it is just for 12 or 13 year olds, and I think, once again, to go back, it was a challenge, but even from a marketer standpoint, it's like you want to reach those people because those are the people that you are going to continue to go after, because they are going to evolve from, you know, gen Alpha to the Gen Zs to the Millennials.
Speaker 2:So, even then, like, snapchat's worth and just case study overall is going to continue to be proved out and I definitely think, snapchat aside, with a lot of these platforms they are constantly fighting for, you know, attention, but even the customer journey side of things, you know, where Snapchat, the process to buy something is anywhere from one step to four steps. Tiktok, that could look different. Youtube, it could be one click or scroll, you know, and I think, as we continue to grow into 2025 and just platforms in general change. That is going to be the demand for attention. We are in the, you know, attention deficit and the attention economy and I'm definitely excited to see how that pans out as we continue to, you know, go throughout the year.
Speaker 1:How beneficial was the uh quote, unquote TikTok ban for you all and like freaking out brands that they need to pay attention to other social channels than just you know yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean selfish from a consumer facing perspective. Take the business out of it. I love TikTok, put the business in me, back in. I was jumping for joy. I think, too, you know it does prove the point that these marketers are very reliant on the big three. Yes, they work, but you know that doesn't that shouldn't be an excuse for you to stop just at the big three YouTube, tiktok and Instagram for all brands and all agencies, anyone right now to be like, okay, where can we next best integrate? Because my personal opinion is, even if TikTok is to stay, the algorithm is going to look completely different, it's going to be heavily controlled and TikTok still isn't. I mean, my four new page literally has never been the same since the ban, you know, got overturned. So I definitely think it's an eye-opening, you know, place for brands and agencies and just marketers in general to look. But I think too, you know, really emphasizing the capabilities of platforms like Snapchat. You know, once again, it's a knowledge thing.
Speaker 2:There are so many barriers and, at the end of the day, another challenge that Hope and I have heard is just like oh, we don't have bandwidth where it's like, our team can come in, support whatever. That's great, but I think, from a bandwidth stance, it's like how many people are in the mindset of I'm here from nine to five and that's it, and then how many people are in the creator economy of like I'm here to learn while doing my job, if it's learning and researching on the weekend, or you know, I don't take an hour for a lunch break, I take 30 minutes to invest in the social strategy side of things, whatever that may be. And I definitely still think there's a conflict there. Of one, people are lazy.
Speaker 2:Two, bandwidth is also, you know, small and kind of tight. And then three, on top of that, the knowledge barrier. It's just like the perfect potion to where Hope and I you know, hope and her team, me and my team really need to make sure that when we're on calls, we execute, you know accordingly and give people you know facts and you know just more statistics to prove our points to where they're like. Why wouldn't we do this?
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I think sometimes too, people when they're in their traditional ways and they hear something like Snapchat or they hear another platform that they can potentially explore, they feel like why would I reinvent the wheel? Like why am I gonna fix something that's not broken? But I think the argument with that, and the thing that I always say all the time, is where the downfall of marketing is, when you start assuming your target audience. So there's brands. So many times I'll speak with them on our brand side of business and I'll many times I'll speak with them on our brand side of business and I'll say I'll propose, let's say, certain creators or a certain strategy, and they're like no, our demos are X, Y, Z. And I was like, have you tried potentially reaching this other audience? And maybe it's a specific style of product that I've seen other clients test out that have worked very, very well.
Speaker 3:I think where the really big brands succeed is once you become a little bit more open-minded of what consumers can I start targeting? Am I able and am I willing to put some sort of test budget to see maybe my audience is older than I thought, or maybe my audience is younger than I thought, or maybe it's both. It doesn't mean for some of these products it's not confined to an age, it's not combined to a certain generation of people either. So I think it's something that brands need to start opening up their minds to as well. Where it doesn't mean you need to put all your ad dollars or all your budget, it's definitely worth exploring.
Speaker 1:Are there types of brands that Snapchat makes more sense for than others? I mean, that's sort of an obvious question. I would say less, but I guess what are the types of brands that should be evaluating Snapchat? More aggressively than others.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, I definitely think Snapchat has a variety of niches of brands that can be integrated with. The CBG brands, the fashion, the beauty, the lifestyle brands, the fitness brands, the foodie brands they all do great on Snapchat Restaurants, princess Polly, ibm and Tech that's one of our clients. They have really seen massive success on the platform. But, that being said, I think Snapchat is extremely brand safe compared to other platforms, and so my personal, you know, kind of testament is gambling companies or supplement companies. To an extent, it's all about how you frame it. Supplement companies to an extent it's all about how you frame it.
Speaker 2:But you know, gambling, I think you know cannabis, nicotine, alcohol. Those are the brands that personally, I would say will have a harder time finding success on Snapchat. However, that doesn't mean that they can't be integrated. You just have to properly do it and properly frame, just like everything. And you know, especially for the alcohol brands, they all have snapchat accounts, they're all verified, they're all public, but it's showing and making sure that when you're activating with the creator or doing paid, it's targeted to the right kind of consumer and then worded very specifically of you know, 21, older, please do not drink. You know, drive responsibly, stuff like that.
Speaker 1:So yeah, not, not advertising alcohol to the 13. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:I also think another thing I want to add to that as well is like it's really important, you know, for me and my team, when we're talking with these brands, to communicate to them the purpose of these different platforms as well. So I was actually talking with Snapchat a few weeks ago and they said they're like listen, our platform it's not for virality, this is a platform of community. There are instances where, you know, content does go viral on Snapchat. It doesn't mean it doesn't have a reach. We have a lot of creators that are getting massive reach. However, it is one of the strongest platforms that I've seen for conversion, numbers One because it's so easy. The reason for that being is it's very similar to like Instagram stories, where you have a product and you can put a sticker link and people tap on it and literally shop right there in that Like. It can't get any easier, and that's with organic content. Typically on other platforms, you can really only do that with paid and like boosting behind it to add that shop feature. Snapchat was it basically allows you to bypass that. So we've seen really strong conversions with it.
Speaker 3:Now, if you're really aiming for awareness, I can definitely see that being a TikTok or YouTube play. But realistically, it's like Colin said at the beginning of this you have to think about the customer journey and how many hurdles are people going to go through and links are they going to click to find a product, to buy it? You need to make it as simple as possible and I think that's where Snapchat is really winning for these brands. So, like Colin mentioned before, a lot of the most successful brands that we've been seeing, it's kind of those like lower touch products You'd have, like a mascara or a clothing company. There's like a sweatshirt or an outfit that people are looking to buy. Again, we have seen larger brands activate. So, for example, like mcdonald's or toyota, you're not going to buy that off of snapchat. So the awareness play is still there, but I would definitely see say we've seen it the most successful with brands that are looking to convert no-transcript.
Speaker 1:The duolingos of the world and you know you start to see like Taco Bell and Wendy's are like funny now on social media, are there applications for non-consumer product brands within Snapchat?
Speaker 3:yes, absolutely, and it's kind of similar to what you're seeing with the non-consumer brands do on other platforms, but a little bit different on Snapchat. An example I can use for this is we work really closely with the Chicago Bulls. So they were doing Summer League in Vegas and then they just recently it was one home game that they had where they were showing their new court in Chicago. We were working with them to basically get creators on the ground to do a takeover of the Chicago Bulls page on Snapchat, where you have the creator there, they promote it on their snap and say hey, you can find all the updates tonight on the Chicago Bulls page. I'm going to do a takeover, find all my content there. We push that audience to the Bulls page and then you have the creator showcasing the court, reveal the game, everything they're doing throughout the night.
Speaker 3:The way that it's different on Snapchat than other I would say like platforms that brands are using is the content is so not curated it is. You pull out your phone and you're like oh hey, guys, like this is. I am Like look at the court, like very FaceTime with a friend is what they like to call it super casual. We've seen a really good response from an audience because of that. From what I've noticed, people just feel kind of sick and tired being sold to. There's a really big issue on you. Pull up TikTok and what do you see? A TikTok live. I can go shop. Tiktok shop, buy this, buy that. It's like okay. Sometimes I just want to see normal, casual content of a creator doing what they do best, and brands have been leveraging that a ton on Snapchat to showcase behind the scenes of these exclusive events yeah, I think people are a little bit overwhelmed with the amount of just like in your face consumerism that exists on on some of these apps yeah you, you will find more success in conversions and purchasing once someone doesn't feel like they're being sold to, and I think, again, that's where the brands have found so much success.
Speaker 3:I want to check on this stat exactly, but if I remember correctly, it's people are 35% more likely to purchase a product they see on Snapchat. This is coming directly from the Snapchat stats that came out last quarter, which I find really interesting, because the way that people are posting on Snapchat it's not to sell and I think that's what sells people. It's oh, they're posting this because they actually like it. It's not. You're posting it on TikTok and you have to have 97 disclosures in the caption and people are like you got paid to do that.
Speaker 3:You know what I'm saying. Like it kind of takes away the sentiment from that. It's like oh, do you actually really like the product? I'm not sure. So I think that you build a unique relationship with your audience on Snapchat and then it's our job to communicate that with the brands and advise them on how do you tap into this really unique thing that's going on in the market right now that not a lot of not a lot of brands are really doing. The brands that are tapping into this they're the fortune 500 brands as of right now, cause they have big enough teams to see these trends happening. For the mid to small size brands, they want to stick with what's working. But I always highly encourage try to push yourself out of that a little bit and you can find a ton of success.
Speaker 2:I agree. And I think another thing to Hope's point, where it's like I was talking to someone today you know that the smaller tier creators with not the hundreds you know hundreds of thousands of followers, they tend to have more engaged communities where the bigger followers or the bigger people who have you know the extensive reach of millions of people, you know they are really used for a brand awareness play. But I think the really interesting thing about Snap, of no matter how big you are or how small you are, like Hope said, you're still building that community because the content style on Snapchat is that FaceTime with a friend. If you know, we are on FaceTime for nine hours a day. What are you going to show me? That is what is replicated on Snapchat. You know people are posting anywhere from 20 frames a day to 300.
Speaker 2:I've seen even 500 and it's literally taking people through your day, and so I think that's another unique value add that Snapchat has that you know Instagram surely doesn't? No one's posting 500 times, you know, a day. On Instagram everyone wants to be curated and picture perfect. Tiktok. It's like no one's posting that many shorts. I mean, I still have yet to find someone who's posting more than like six to eight shorts a day, but like, are you even monetizing on shorts? Heavily no, and YouTube itself is long form. So I think Snapchat has cracked that code of no matter how big or small, there's still that audience affinity and that relationship to where, whether you are a huge creator on the platform or a smaller creator on the platform, selling people feel as if it's authentic compared to other platforms. So I want to call that out as well.
Speaker 1:It's such a crazy amount of content.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's insane. It's absolutely insane and I think, once again, you know we have people on our end getting anywhere from you know 5 million views in a 28 day period, which is like okay, whatever, which essentially just means reach all the way up to you know, the highest I've ever seen on my end has been like four or 500 million. I know creators that we don't rep are getting like one billion views in a 28 day period. That is not being found on TikTok or Instagram. So, once again, I think there are a lot of cons to an extent when it comes to Snapchat, in terms of like, their data is backend, so people can't see it, you know, or you know their API is private compared to the others where it's public.
Speaker 2:Those are cons, but I also think a huge, huge part is the knowledge barrier, and once people every single person me and Hope have ever talked to and we give a 15, 20 minute spiel on Snapchat, their minds are automatically turned of like, oh my God, why haven't I even ever thought about this? And I think, once again, more knowledge becomes, more people wanting to activate or test and overall, that will start to happen with Snapchat. And I think the thing that it's most comparable to is TikTok, in the sense of when TikTok first came out, no one was using it. And I think the thing that it's most comparable to is TikTok in the sense of when TikTok first came out, no one was using it.
Speaker 2:I hated the app. I thought it was the dumbest thing ever. It's just kids dancing. And now look at us and you know half the world. They're all. You know, super, super. You know close with the app. Brands are activating, agencies are putting it across all programs and I genuinely think that is what's going to happen with Snap. It's just a matter of time knowledge and their API becoming public.
Speaker 1:Well, I doubt what's his name. Evan is listening to this podcast.
Speaker 2:Evan, if you are great to meet you.
Speaker 1:And make your api public.
Speaker 2:Exactly, let's get on the call and talk about it. But yeah, 100 well.
Speaker 1:I appreciate both of you coming on and sharing your insights and a little bit about your uh journey. Uh, sounds like uh. It was a real opportunity for brands on on snapchat, can't that? I'm going to go download it and start making 300 pieces of content a day, but kudos to the person that is able to do that and also wants to do that. I mean, honestly, that sounds terrible, but I guess, if you have a big enough following, 300 pieces of content is not too much. I think my girlfriend would yell at me if I posted more than two Instagram stories. Exactly. I'm going to stick with the curated, yet probably not that great content.
Speaker 2:Well, if you ever change your mind, you know who to keep it to. Yeah, super excited for our journey. We'll keep you and your audience updated and we can go from there.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Well, before we hop, can you let everybody know where they can find you online if they want to connect, and then you'll learn more about Snapchat or their brand or any of your other services?
Speaker 2:Yeah, 100%. So our website is wwwhdmediaus. Our LinkedIn is just hdmedia. If you search it up on LinkedIn, hope's LinkedIn is Hope Georgiou and my LinkedIn is Colin Harrington. And then, lastly, our Instagram is at HG Digital.
Speaker 1:Awesome. We'll make sure to include some show notes or include the links in the show notes. Perfect so that everybody has that, but again, I appreciate you coming on. Thanks for hopping on with us. For everybody that's listening, as always, this is Brandon Amoroso. You can find me at BrandonAmorosocom or Scalistai. Thanks for listening and I will see you next time.
Speaker 2:Perfect.