From an advertiser perspective, the most interesting thing about Snap is the Cost-Per-Action (CPA) revenue model. Today, Paid Search = Cost-Per-Click, so introducing CPA into this medium can be confusing. It's really pretty simple.

Snap gives you 2 options on CPA: Fixed CPA and Variable CPA. Fixed means you pay us a set amount for a given action. You, the advertiser, chooses what that action is. The only constraint is that the action must happen online. Typical Fixed CPA actions are a download, a completed form, a sign-up etc. Variable CPA means % of sale.

Once you've decided upon the action, you then bid on what you are willing to pay to have that action occur. One way to think about this is if you are doing CPC now, how many clicks does it normally take for you to generate that action? What do you bid for each click? Let me give you an example…say you are a mortgage broker and your goal is to get someone to fill out a form so you can call them later and close the sale. Currently, you are bidding $6 per click, and it takes 4 clicks to get someone to complete a form. Bid $24 at Snap for a completed form.

Once you've decided your action and your bid, we give you some code (commonly referred to as a tracking pixel) that you place on your site on the confirming page of the chosen action. That sounds a little complicated, but just call or email us if you can't figure that part out. It's really not.

The big question that people ask now is, "Where will I rank?" That's a little involved, so I'll save it for a future post.