Snapchat is potentially the most undervalued and overlooked social media platform.

Snapchat 有可能是最被低估和忽視的社交媒體平臺。

And that's because unless the year of your birth begins with a 2, it's likely you've written off Snapchat as a remnant of the past and an app just for ephemeral nude sharing.

這是因為除非你的出生年份是以 2 開頭的，否則你很可能已經把 Snapchat 看作是過去的殘餘，只是一個用來分享短暫裸體的應用程式。

And while the latter might be true, Snapchat is still growing, and pretty fast, with their parent company, Snap, reporting 432 million daily active users, and 800 million monthly active users.

雖然後者可能是事實，但 Snapchat 仍在增長，而且速度相當快，其母公司 Snap 的日活躍用戶達到 4.32 億，月活躍用戶達到 8 億。

While this might fall short of the astronomical numbers posted by the likes of Facebook, Instagram and TikTok, it's still far more than platforms like Twitter, which we all apparently have to endlessly care about.

雖然這可能比不上 Facebook、Instagram 和 TikTok 等平臺發佈的天文數字，但仍然遠遠超過了 Twitter 等平臺，而我們顯然都必須無休止地關注 Twitter。

The thing is, despite Snapchat being far bigger than you might have expected, the company is still struggling, with its CEO recently announcing some pretty radical changes to try and save the company.

問題是，儘管 Snapchat 的規模遠超你的預期，但該公司仍在苦苦掙扎，其 CEO 最近宣佈了一些相當激進的變革，試圖挽救公司。

So let's unpack Snapchat's popularity paradox, why it's struggling despite its huge user success, and why solving this problem might be harder than it first appears.

讓我們來解讀一下 Snapchat 的流行悖論，為什麼它在獲得巨大用戶成功的同時仍在苦苦掙扎，以及為什麼解決這個問題可能比想象中要難。

Before we start, if you haven't already, please consider subscribing to TLDR Business.

在我們開始之前，如果你還沒有訂閱，請考慮訂閱 TLDR Business。

For videos about everything from why Google might be broken up, or the AI bubble, to what's gone wrong for Starbucks, VW and McDonalds.

影片內容涉及方方面面，從谷歌為何可能被分拆、AI 泡沫，到星巴克、大眾和麥當勞出了什麼問題。

So we've already established that Snapchat is still a massively popular and growing platform.

我們已經確定，Snapchat 仍然是一個大受歡迎且不斷髮展的平臺。

But let's dig into why this is.

但是，讓我們來探究一下為什麼會這樣。

A major part of Snapchat's appeal is its ephemeral content and creative tools, both of which resonate deeply with younger demographics.

Snapchat 的吸引力主要在於其短暫的內容和創意工具，這兩點在年輕人群中產生了深刻的共鳴。

Features like Stories, Disappearing Messages, Augmented Reality Lenses and Bitmoji have made Snapchat into an incredibly popular platform for younger generations looking for an outlet for self-expression.

故事、消失的資訊、增強現實鏡片和 Bitmoji 等功能使 Snapchat 成為年輕一代尋找自我表達管道的一個非常受歡迎的平臺。

In fact, the platform's design actively encourages this kind of spontaneity, with content that feels more personal and less polished than what's typically served up on rival apps.

事實上，該平臺的設計積極鼓勵這種自發性，與競爭對手的應用程序相比，它的內容更有個性，也不那麼精緻。

For many users, Snapchat offers a private, less permanent space to interact with their friends, far removed from the curated feeds of other social media platforms.

對於許多用戶來說，Snapchat 為他們提供了一個私密的、不那麼固定的空間來與朋友互動，遠離了其他社交媒體平臺的策劃式推送。

And this is something that Snapchat have actually been advertising based on recently, showing off this feature.

而這正是 Snapchat 最近一直在宣傳和展示的功能。

And ultimately, you can see how powerful this trend is by how quickly other apps, especially Instagram, have borrowed these concepts and features, from Stories to Disappearing Messages.

最終，你可以從其他應用程序，尤其是 Instagram，借鏡這些概念和功能（從故事到消失的資訊）的速度之快，看出這一趨勢有多麼強大。

However, this very appeal is in itself a paradox.

然而，這種呼籲本身就是一個悖論。

While Snapchat is incredibly popular among its younger user base, this demographic isn't exactly aligned with the standard revenue models pioneered and mastered by Meta and other major social media apps.

雖然 Snapchat 在年輕用戶群中非常受歡迎，但這一人群並不完全符合 Meta 和其他主要社交媒體應用開創和掌握的標準收入模式。

Snapchat has the users, but it can't monetize them.

Snapchat 擁有用戶，但無法實現貨幣化。

But why?

但為什麼呢？

Well, firstly, having a strong, focused, younger user base means that Snapchat's audience is nowhere near as diverse or broad as its competitors are.

首先，Snapchat 擁有強大、集中、年輕的用戶群，這意味著其閱聽人的多樣性和廣泛性遠不及競爭對手。

Facebook might wish that younger people still thought it was as cool as Snapchat, but while incredibly active, this younger age group tends to have less disposable income and different spending habits than older demographics.

Facebook 也許希望年輕人仍然認為它像 Snapchat 一樣酷，但儘管活躍度驚人，這一年輕群體的可支配收入往往較少，消費習慣也與年長人群不同。

As such, advertisers prefer platforms with a more varied user base, where they can target different segments of the population, including those with more purchasing power, i.e. those with income streams more significant than just pocket money.

廣告商更青睞用戶群更加多樣化的平臺，在這些平臺上，他們可以針對不同的人群，包括購買力更強的人群，即收入來源比零花錢更多的人群。

It's not just the users either.

這也不僅僅是用戶的問題。

Snapchat's ad platform has historically been far less sophisticated than their competitors.

從歷史上看，Snapchat 的廣告平臺遠不如競爭對手複雜。

Back when they first introduced them, Snapchat's advertising tools were far less developed, lacking the targeting, measurement, and analytics capability that advertisers learned to expect.

Snapchat 最初推出廣告工具時，其開發程度還遠遠不夠，缺乏廣告商所期待的定位、測量和分析能力。

This made it harder for Snapchat to attract large-scale ad campaigns, as advertisers were hesitant to allocate significant budgets to a platform where the return on investment was uncertain.

這使得 Snapchat 更難吸引大規模的廣告投放，因為廣告商不願將大量預算分配給一個投資回報不確定的平臺。

Even now, the tools and infrastructure offered by Snapchat lags behind, limiting the investment that major companies feel happy to pour into it.

即便是現在，Snapchat 提供的工具和基礎設施仍然落後，限制了大公司樂於為其投入的資金。

Even if advertisers did make the jump though, the content itself is inherently difficult to monetize.

即使廣告商跳槽，內容本身也很難盈利。

While vertical video and ephemeral content are key to the appeal of the platform, they're also just really hard to advertise against.

雖然垂直影判和短影片內容是該平臺吸引人的關鍵所在，但它們也很難做廣告。

That's partly because brands are just more used to making vertical and static content for TV, VOD, and print, so developing new vertical-friendly content requires additional time, effort, and creativity.

部分原因是品牌更習慣於為電視、VOD 和印刷品製作垂直和靜態內容，所以開發新的垂直友好內容需要額外的時間、精力和創意。

But that doesn't fully explain the issue, because the likes of TikTok seem to be doing fine in converting advertisers to digital and vertical.

但這並不能完全解釋這個問題，因為 TikTok 等公司在將廣告客戶轉化為數字廣告和垂直廣告方面似乎做得很好。

So it's also that placing ads on a platform like Snap specifically is just hard.

在 Snap 這樣的平臺上投放廣告也很難。

Sure, you can stick some ads within the discovery feed and between stories.

當然，你可以在 "發現 "頻道和故事之間插入一些廣告。

In fact, that goes some way to explain why the company has put so much emphasis on these areas in recent years.

事實上，這也在一定程度上解釋了為什麼公司近年來如此重視這些領域。

But this can only go so far.

但這只能到此為止。

After all, people are coming to Snapchat primarily to send photos, videos, and chat.

畢竟，人們使用 Snapchat 主要是為了發送照片、影片和聊天。

Thus far, Snapchat have refused to properly implement ads in this core section of the app, giving them far fewer platforms to surface ads than something like YouTube or Facebook that can constantly dump ads wherever they feel like.

迄今為止，Snapchat 一直拒絕在應用程式的這一核心部分適當投放廣告，這使得他們可以投放廣告的平臺遠遠少於 YouTube 或 Facebook 等可以不斷隨心所欲地投放廣告的公司。

With these barriers in place, many advertisers have just decided to go elsewhere.

由於存在這些障礙，許多廣告商決定另謀出路。

Snap might have a big audience, but that audience is sufficiently hard to reach, target, and analyse through Snapchat that many advertisers have just decided that it'll be easier to go to rival platforms like TikTok to find a very similar audience.

Snap 可能擁有大量閱聽人，但這些閱聽人很難通過 Snapchat 接觸、鎖定和分析，以至於許多廣告商認為，去 TikTok 等競爭對手的平臺尋找類似的閱聽人會更容易。

Admittedly, their competitors are also having similar issues.

誠然，他們的競爭對手也有類似的問題。

Since Apple introduced the app tracking transparency policy in 2021, it's become far harder for companies to track users between apps.

自 2021 年蘋果公司推出應用程式追蹤透明政策以來，公司在應用程式之間追蹤用戶的難度大大增加。

Now, that's a good thing from a privacy perspective, but it's made it harder for companies to target users, and reduced advertising rates across the industry.

現在，從隱私的角度來看，這是件好事，但卻增加了公司瞄準用戶的難度，降低了整個行業的廣告費率。

And all of this has hit Snapchat particularly hard, as a mobile-only company who are particularly popular in countries where iOS is dominant.

而這一切對 Snapchat 的打擊尤為嚴重，因為作為一家純移動公司，Snapchat 在 iOS 系統占主導地位的國家尤其受歡迎。

So how can Snapchat solve these issues?

那麼，Snapchat 如何解決這些問題呢？

Well, they've recently announced some pretty major changes to the app.

最近，他們宣佈對應用程式進行一些重大調整。

They're planning on redesigning Snapchat's infamously hostile navigation system to try and attract more, especially older users, and also to emphasise some of the easier-to-monetise areas of the app.

他們正計劃重新設計 Snapchat 聲名狼藉的導航系統，以吸引更多用戶，尤其是老年用戶，同時強調該應用中一些更容易被貨幣化的領域。

They're also rolling out more advertising across the platform, with them even planning to introduce adverts in the middle of chat conversations, something that essentially no other platform has tried, for kind of obvious reasons.

他們還將在整個平臺上推出更多廣告，甚至計劃在哈拉對話中引入廣告，出於顯而易見的原因，這基本上是其他平臺從未嘗試過的。

Now, these changes are obviously going to annoy some people, but in his announcement, CEO Evan Spiegel tacitly admitted that they were being forced into making these changes due to their fiscal constraints, saying that the growth of our digital advertising business is one of our most important inputs to our long-term revenue potential, and investors are concerned that we aren't growing faster.

現在，這些變化顯然會惹惱一些人，但 CEO 埃文-斯皮格爾（Evan Spiegel）在公告中默認，他們是迫於財政壓力才做出這些改變的，他說數位廣告業務的增長是我們長期收入潛力最重要的投入之一，投資者擔心我們的增長速度不夠快。

And to be fair, Snapchat genuinely doesn't have many other great options here.

平心而論，Snapchat 在這方面確實沒有太多其他好的選擇。

Ordinarily, a company like Snapchat, with a highly loyal and growing user base, would be the ideal target for an acquisition by a bigger market player like Meta.

通常情況下，像 Snapchat 這樣擁有高度忠誠且不斷增長的用戶群的公司，是 Meta 這樣的大型市場參與者收購的理想目標。

In fact, they did try to acquire Snap back in 2013 for more than $3 billion.

事實上，早在 2013 年，他們就曾試圖以超過 30 億美元的價格收購 Snap。

However, back then, Spiegel wasn't keen, and since, he's spoken at length about the independence of Snap and its value as a rival to the big social media behemoths.

不過，斯皮格爾當時並不熱衷於此，此後，他一直在大談 Snap 的獨立性及其作為大型社交媒體巨頭競爭對手的價值。

So unless he's under a lot of pressure, he's likely to continue resisting a sale to the likes of Meta.

除非他面臨很大的壓力，否則他很可能會繼續抵制出售給梅塔這樣的公司。

Now obviously, Meta isn't the only option.

現在，Meta 顯然不是唯一的選擇。

But regardless of the acquirer, deals like this are facing increased regulatory scrutiny in the US, with the market for major acquisitions substantially chilled under Biden.

但無論收購方是誰，類似的交易在美國都面臨著越來越嚴格的監管審查，拜登執政後，大型收購市場大幅受挫。

Now a new administration in the White House could theoretically change this, but Trump's not the biggest fan of social media either, and Vance actually praised FTC Chair Lina Khan recently, describing her as one of the few people in the Biden administration I think is doing a pretty good job.

現在，白宮的新政府理論上可以改變這種狀況，但特朗普也不是社交媒體的忠實擁護者，萬斯最近還稱讚了聯邦貿易委員會主席莉娜-汗，稱她是拜登政府中少數幾個我認為幹得不錯的人之一。

As such, an acquisition for Snap looks pretty hard at this point, but admittedly not impossible.

Snap 目前看來很難被收購，但也並非不可能。

Larger companies are still likely to be interested, with other platforms struggling to attract younger users.

由於其他平臺難以吸引年輕用戶，規模較大的公司仍可能對此感興趣。

Adding Snap to another existing company could help to onboard a very useful audience.

將 Snap 添加到另一家現有的公司中，有助於吸收非常有用的閱聽人。

Not only that, other companies are also likely confident that they could better monetize Snapchat than Snap do, increasing the company's earnings per user, and maybe, just maybe, actually turning a proper profit.

不僅如此，其他公司也很可能相信，他們能比 Snapchat 更好地實現貨幣化，增加公司的每用戶收益，也許，只是也許，能真正實現盈利。

With issues like these, it's often hard to come to the right conclusions.

對於這樣的問題，往往很難得出正確的結論。

So if you want to improve your decision making, you'll want to check out Brilliant.

如果你想提高決策能力，就一定要看看 Brilliant。

Brilliant is where you learn by doing, with thousands of interactive lessons in maths, data analysis, programming, and AI.

Brilliant 讓您在實踐中學習，提供數千節數學、數據分析、寫程式和 AI 方面的互動課程。

For instance, there's the Scientific Thinking course, which takes you on an interactive tour of our physical world.

例如，"科學思維 "課程將帶您對我們的物理世界進行互動式參觀。

You'll engage with key scientific principles and theories, from simple machines like gears and pulleys, to Einstein's special theory of relativity.

從齒輪和滑輪等簡單機械，到愛因斯坦的狹義相對論，您將接觸到重要的科學原理和理論。

It's not just a bunch of lectures either, you'll learn by doing, with hands-on lessons that will have you comparing circuits to understand voltage and current, playing snooker to learn the rules of collision, planning your itinerary for an intergalactic music festival on a space-time diagram, and more.

它也不只是一堆講座，你將在實踐中學習，通過實踐課程比較電路以瞭解電壓和電流，打斯諾克以學習碰撞規則，在時空圖上規劃星際音樂節的行程等等。

That way, you'll build your natural intuition while gaining deep knowledge of scientific principles.

這樣，你就能在深入瞭解科學原理的同時，培養自己的自然直覺。

Find out more and try everything Brilliant has to offer for a full 30 days by visiting brilliant.org forward slash tldr, or by clicking the link in the description.

訪問 brilliant.org forward slash tldr 或點擊說明欄中的連結，瞭解更多資訊，並在 30 天內試用 Brilliant 提供的所有服務。

That way, you'll also get 20% off an annual premium subscription.

這樣，您還可以享受年度高級訂閱 8 折優惠。

Thanks for your support, and thanks to Brilliant for sponsoring this video.

感謝您的支持，感謝 Brilliant 贊助本影片。