Welcome back to The Shoppe! This week, we’re talking about Uber’s in-app advertising, Snapchat trends, American Eagle’s partnership with Twitch, and TikTok’s partnership with Shopify. Don’t forget to subscribe so you can be notified every time we post!

Uber Starts In-App Advertising

Uber announced that it is piloting in-app advertisements to a small portion of users. These advertisements are shown while a user is waiting for a ride. CEO Travis Kalanick once rejected advertising within the app because it would detract from the user experience. The ride-sharing platform has been struggling to attract users back even as most COVID-19 restrictions have been lifted. The first advertiser to appear on the Uber app is Marriott with a carousel ad, and the company plans to add in more. This is not the only way that advertisers can get involved with Uber. Uber also offers Uber OOH, its car-top advertising where drivers can earn money for displaying ads on their vehicles. Uber is spending nearly $250 million in its effort to bring customers back to the app after the company lost nearly $2 billion in revenue in 2020. 

Snapchat Trends Offers New Insights to Advertisers

Snapchat has unveiled Snapchat Trends, a new tool that allows users to track the success of a keyword or a topic. Users can input up to 5 keywords into the Snapchat Trends website, which will display a line graph of the keyword’s usage over time and related Snaps. The website also features trending keywords to further help marketers create content. Nearly 70 percent of teens and 25 percent of adults use Snapchat, which means that Snapchat Trends could be a vital tool in reaching a younger demographic. The social media platform states that Trends can be used for various purposes such as product market research, creative messaging and copywriting, building user profiles, researching key moments, and for competitive research. The Trends feature comes amid Snapchat’s release of other advertiser tools. For example, Snapchat released Campaign Lab last month, which gave advertisers the ability to experiment with campaigns and see what works. 

American Eagle Forms Partnership With Twitch

American Eagle has formed a creative partnership with the live-streaming platform Twitch. The two companies will co-produce custom segments about gaming and other topics. American Eagle will also choose creators to partner with to highlight their brand and expand its reach. The clothing company plans to work with streamers to create collections in order to drive customers to their website. Twitch has become more popular over the past year, growing from 1.36 million viewers in January 2020 to 2.9 million in January 2021, and has been expanding its offerings to reach non-gamers with concerts, cooking lessons and fitness classes. It is the third brand to partner with Twitch following Chipotle Mexican Grill and Ally Financial. American Eagle has concentrated on its social media presence recently, with TikTok ad campaigns and Bitmoji digital clothing collections.