Have you ever wanted to turn your head into a giant taco?
Maybe that's kind of an odd question, a question not often posed, but the latest data from Snapchat shows that many people do, in fact, want to make themselves look like Mexican food.
As part of a recent campaign, Taco Bell launched a sponsored lens on Snapchat that made people look like this:
That lens became the most popular on the platform to date, being viewed more than 224 million times over a 24 hour period.
And while that figure in itself is amazing, the popularity of the Taco Bell lens underlines the power of creativity and fun on Snapchat - and how, by using both, brands can generate big results.
As per Ad Week:
"The average user played with Taco Bell's ad for 24 seconds before sending it as a "snap." In terms of unique plays-or the number of times individual people interacted with the ad-the campaign generated 12.5 years' worth of play in a day, according to Snapchat."
While Snapchat may not be for everyone, and some still see it as a fad app, those numbers are pretty hard to ignore.
Snapchat launched Lenses last September, enabling users to alter their appearance in the app via some pretty bizarre and disturbing video mask-type devices, powered by facial recognition technology.
They're very weird, but they're also good fun, even if they do cause you to pull faces at your smartphone as if you're miming extreme anger or surprise.
Lenses, you see, have interactive elements - fire that shoots out of your eyes or flowers that lift from your breath. Those animations are triggered by facial movements, raising your eyebrows or opening your mouth. It makes perfect sense to you as you're doing it, but to those who don't know what you're doing - who are watching from the 'real world' - you're interactions with the app may look slightly disturbing. This GIF of Donald Trump sums it up best.
Trump trying to trigger a snapchat filter pic.twitter.com/5MsgUc7bjR
- Ryan Gross (@wayfairer123) January 23, 2016
Despite this, Lenses have become one of the most popular additions on the app, and one of the many innovations that have helped ensure Snapchat stays one step ahead of the game. Snapchat says Lenses are used in more than 10 million snaps every day. Lenses have proven so popular, in fact, that Facebook purchased image-altering app MSQRD earlier this year to, presumably, offer similar functionality within their own apps.
Of course, running a Lenses campaign doesn't come cheap - reports suggest that sponsored lenses can cost up to $750,000 per day on major holidays, and around $500,000 on a regular weekday. That puts them well beyond the reach of most brands, but for those who can afford it, and whose target market falls within Snapchat's key demographic bracket, it could prove to be a worthy investment.
And if you were wondering why turning your head into a giant taco holds such appeal, I'll, once again, defer to Mr Trump to demonstrate.
Life Hack: Open a Trump speech and use a @Snapchat filter. Fun for hours. pic.twitter.com/wpPOp19z7E
- Rep. Dave Ober (@DaveOber) May 5, 2016
You have to admit, it's a bit fun.
If you haven't checked out lenses, or even Snapchat more generally, it's worth downloading the app and checking out why it's becoming so popular.