How Snap Can Turn on the Creator Spigot

Where does Snap go from here? The nearly fourteen-year-old company is struggling to grow its ad business, particularly compared to larger Meta Platforms and Google’s YouTube. At the same time, CEO Evan Spiegel remains laser focused on his long-time, big bet: the company’s augmented reality glasses, Spectacles. To keep funding the AR project, Snapchat parent has begun to discuss ways to raise outside money and even has considered spinning it off, as we scooped in this Weekend story on Friday. 

Whether Snap will ever see a mega hit with Spectacles is far from certain. In the short term, Snapchat should focus on revitalizing its main advertising business by ramping up its creator efforts and improving Spotlight, its TikTok competitor. While the company has made major strides in getting more creators posting on the app—and bringing back celebrities like Justin Bieber—its short-form video efforts still lag larger rivals when it comes to viewership and cultural relevance.