It's how most platforms make most of their money. Most users don't give a second thought to how advertising space is bought and sold on those platforms. But it's actually a process which, in order to be effective, requires extensive collaboration and innovation between the platforms and their media-buying partners.

An excellent example of this is the relationship between Snap, the company behind Snapchat, and Ad Dynamo by Aleph, which operates as its official ad sales representative in Africa.

The success of the longstanding partnership relies on Ad Dynamo by Aleph's ability to help African advertisers understand how to leverage Snap's highly engaged local community and innovative advertising offerings to reach the customers they most need.

The partners point out that this means ensuring advertisers know how to use the latest technologies — like Augmented Reality (AR) to grab the attention of potential customers.

"Attention is key, and there's more and more competition for it," says Errington. "If you're a brand or an agency, it's vital to understand what is the best strategy and formats that can catch consumers' attention."

He adds it's also essential that platforms and media buyers help clients understand the audiences they're trying to reach. In Africa, that means young people. While other parts of the world deal with the consequences of ageing populations and declining birth rates, more than 60% of Africans are under 25. And by 2030, Africa is expected to be home to 42% of the world's young people.

Errington says, "The dominance of youth, and how we help curate and influence and connect with the youth population and understanding that they are the future is key."

When reaching those youth audiences, Snap is challenging to beat.

"Snap has been doing well in terms of user growth," says Joel. "As of now, Snap has a global community of over 750 million. That growth isn’t being driven only by the US and Europe but by Africa, South America, and other emerging markets."

According to Errington, Snap in South Africa has dramatically increased its user base in the past five years. In part, he says, this is down to the philosophy behind Snapchat as a place where you can be yourself and have fun. Africa, as a whole, is a camera-centric region in communication.

Joel adds how the vast improvements made on the app for the Android community in Africa back in 2017 dramatically improved the user experience and gave a resurgence in adoption.

"Snapchat is a place for real connections. It was designed to be different to traditional social platforms and to remove the pressures of curated, perfect content that people see in other places. That’s why Snapchat is consistently ranked as people's number one happiest platform," says Joel.

“One of the main things our community loves about Snap is playing with our Augmented Reality (AR) lenses - over 250m people play with these lenses daily. They started as a tool to make your snaps more fun or creative - like our puking rainbows lens. But AR has evolved to be a engaging advertising format. People can fully immerse themselves in a brand and then share it with their friends - that kind of engagement and traction is gold dust to brands.”

AR isn't just about brand engagement. Snap also pioneered AR try-on lenses so that people can virtually try on clothes, sunglasses and even watches and jewellery. This has not only led to increased conversions for brands, but two-thirds of consumers are less likely to return a product after trying it on through AR. This is great for margins and for the environment.

Errington and Joel add that those features make it much easier to grab the attention of Millenial and Gen Z customers, something that financial institutions have often struggled with.

"When one walks into a room and talks about youth and the challenge that traditional banks have, it’s important to remember that young people don’t have one bank anymore," Joel says. "They have many banks, and each will play a role in their lives. That means that banks can’t use the same media mix they have been using over the past 10 years."

As Joel points out, however, Snap wouldn't be able to help advertisers use its innovative technology to reach young people if it didn't have the right in-market partnerships.

"The way that Snap is able to be in Africa is through a partner like Aleph," Joel concludes. "Without partners like Aleph, Snap wouldn't be able to enter local markets, translate what they have locally, and be able to really help brands and agencies. For many companies, entering a market like Africa sounds far away, expensive and complicated but with a partner, it's easy to remove the barriers."

For more information, visit www.snapchat.com.