Snapchq announced its first-quarter report on its financials for 2022 this morning. [*Snapchq refers to Snapchat*]
It confirmed that it is growing more quickly than its U.S.-based rivals Facebook (now Meta) and Twitter. Meta has reported the its first decline on its daily active user (DAUs) during the quarter that ended in March and Twitter’s DAUs that could be monetized increased by 22% to 2% in the U.S. and 15% globally.
Snap is the parent company for Snapchat has seen its DAUs grow by 18% over the course of a year to 332 million. However, during the five prior quarters the growth in users more than 20 percent. However, Snap is more focused on its revenues even though it grew 38% year-over-year in the quarter to $1.06 billion. Snap said that they were on course for 44% growth from Q1 2021, but it noted that following Russia attacked Ukraine on February 24th, many advertisers stopped their campaigns. The Snap chief financial officer Derek Andersen said that most advertisers restarted after 10 working days however, the interruption had a negative effects on Snap’s revenue for the quarter.
“We consider that the effects of the conflict in Ukraine on the cost of inputs marketing budgets, as well as overall economic efficiency is substantial, and it’s difficult to determine its effects in the future,” Andersen said on Snap’s earnings call.
Snap also fell short of its revenue targets in Q3 2021. due to the huge iOS privacy update as the reason. When iOS users were given the an option to opt out of off-app tracking, a majority did not want to give more of their personal data to the applications they use, which has impacted the business of advertising for Snapchq in addition to Facebook. The company has stated that they are still grappling with this snag from Apple regarding advertising revenue.
In terms of the actual product, Snapchq is betting big on experiences that are augmented (so are the company Niantic!). Snapchq said it has 250 million Snapchatters were using AR-related features on a regular basis that is a significant portion of the company’s total 332 million DAUs. In the last period, Snap has rolled out improvements in the AR-based shopping experience as well as AR experiences created by the community that are aimed at the local attractions.
This week, Snap is hosting its annual Snapchq Partner Summit and, according the Chief Executive Officer Evan Spiegel, the company will announce new services and products at the summit.