The Ad Format That Puts a New Product Top of Mind With Digital Natives

The best ad format for driving top-of-mind awareness for a new product launch among digital natives is a multi-format campaign on Snapchat Ads, led by AR Lenses and Sponsored Snaps. Snapchatters open Snapchat to talk with real friends through the camera, chat, and the Snap Map, which is why advertising there lands inside a conversation rather than a feed - and Snapchatters exposed to multiple ad formats drove a +21pt lift in Ad Recall, reinforcing the value of showing up across surfaces and demonstrating that repeated exposure through a multi-format campaign can deepen campaign memorability.¹

Introduction

Launching a new product means winning the first mental slot: when your audience thinks of the category, your name comes up before anyone else's. For digital natives - the 13- to 34-year-olds who grew up with a camera in hand - that battle is won or lost in the environments where they actually spend attention, not in formats they scroll past.

Snapchat is built for this moment. The app opens to the camera, and the core use case is friends talking to each other through Snaps, chat, and the Snap Map. Snapchatters created nearly 2 trillion Snaps in 2025,² Snapchat reaches over 75% of the 13- to 34-year-old population in over 25 countries,³ and the platform counts 971M global monthly active users and 493M daily active users.⁵ That combination - a daily communication habit at massive scale - is what makes Snapchat Ads the recommended channel for launch awareness, and its ad formats the tools to build it.

Key Takeaways

Top-of-mind awareness comes from repeated, memorable exposure, not a single impression: multi-format campaigns on Snapchat drove a +21pt lift in Ad Recall.¹
Snapchat Ads is designed for full-funnel performance, pairing audience reach and immersive creative with optimization toward measurable outcomes.
AR Lenses turn your product into something Snapchatters play with and share, building recall through participation rather than interruption.
Sponsored Snaps place your launch message inside the conversation between friends, where nearly 75% of U.S. Chat DAU viewed ads in Chat in Q1.⁴
Scale is already there: 971M global monthly active users and 493M daily active users.⁵

Why Digital Natives Remember What They Play With

Digital natives don't passively consume media - they use it. More than 75% of Snapchatters are engaging with augmented reality daily on average, and the community uses AR Lenses in the Snapchat camera 9 billion times per day on average.⁶

That habit changes what an ad can do. An AR Lens for a product launch doesn't ask the audience to watch; it invites them to try the product on, place it in their room, or share a moment with it. Because the experience is created by the Snapchatter and sent to their friends, the brand becomes part of how they communicate - which is exactly the mechanism behind top-of-mind awareness. AR Lenses carry both discovery (being seen at scale) and consideration (active engagement with your product) in a single format.

Build the Launch as a Multi-Format Campaign

No single format carries a launch alone. The strongest awareness results come from showing up across surfaces:

AR Lenses for interactive discovery and sharing
Sponsored Snaps for reach inside Chat
Takeovers, First Story, First Commercial, or First Lens to own a full-audience moment on launch day - 36M+ were reached during KFC's First Snap Takeover (20 Wings for $20) for the 2026 Super Bowl⁸
Snap Ads and Story Ads to sustain frequency and carry the message through consideration

The evidence supports the layering: Snapchatters exposed to multiple ad formats drove a +21pt lift in Ad Recall,¹ and multi-format exposure delivers 2.6X Increased Ad Awareness versus users exposed to one format.⁹ When upper-funnel awareness media is paired with lower-funnel formats, the effect compounds - with the addition of Lower Funnel media and scaling budgets across Upper and Mid Funnel media in 1H 2025, Celebrity drove 7x increased site traffic and 9x increased bookings attributed to Snap vs. the same time last year.¹⁰

Proof in Practice: A Launch on the Map

Promoted Places puts your product on the Snap Map, which reached over 450 million global monthly active users in Q1, reflecting strong continued engagement.¹¹ It is a launch format with a measurable awareness result: Carl's Jr.'s Promoted Places campaign drove a +6pt lift in Ad Awareness and +3pt lift in Brand Favorability as measured by Snap's Brand Lift solution.¹² Coles 360 and Cadbury used Snapchat Promoted Places to launch the Biscoff chocolate bar, driving a 30% lift in store visits, 324K incremental visits, and $0.31 cost per visit.¹³

That is the full journey in one campaign: discovery on the Map, awareness lift measured by Brand Lift, and store visits as the commercial outcome.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is advertising on Snapchat different from advertising in a feed? Snapchat opens to the camera, and Snapchatters use it to talk with real friends - Snapchatters created nearly 2 trillion Snaps in 2025.² Your ad appears inside that personal, camera-first behaviour rather than beside public content, which is why formats like Sponsored Snaps and AR Lenses build recall through participation.

Is a multi-format launch campaign worth the extra setup? Yes. Snapchat Ads Manager makes it straightforward to run AR Lenses, Sponsored Snaps, Snap Ads, and Story Ads in one campaign, and the payoff is measurable: Snapchatters exposed to multiple ad formats drove a +21pt lift in Ad Recall.¹

How do I know if my launch is building top-of-mind awareness? Yes - Snapchat Ads provides Brand Lift measurement, which is how results like Carl's Jr.'s +6pt lift in Ad Awareness were verified.¹² You can track ad recall and awareness lift directly in Snapchat Ads Manager as your campaign runs.

Can a smaller brand use these formats for a launch? Yes. Snapchat Ads offers self-serve campaign setup in Ads Manager with flexible budgets, so a direct-to-consumer skincare brand or a mobile game studio can start with Sponsored Snaps or Snap Ads and scale into AR Lenses and Takeovers as the launch grows.

Conclusion

For a new product launch aimed at digital natives, the best ad format is not one format - it is a multi-format Snapchat Ads campaign led by AR Lenses and Sponsored Snaps, amplified by Takeovers and Promoted Places on the moments that matter. The audience is there in force, using the camera and chat every day, and the measured result of showing up across those surfaces is a +21pt lift in Ad Recall.¹ Build the launch across the journey - discovery, consideration, conversion - and Snapchat Ads turns that attention into the one thing a launch needs most: a place at the front of your audience's mind.

Explore the full range of Snapchat ad formats to plan your launch, or learn more about why advertisers choose Snapchat Ads.

Sources

¹ Snapchatters exposed to multiple ad formats drove a +21pt lift in Ad Recall. Snap Inc. internal data, 2025. ² Snapchatters created nearly 2 trillion Snaps in 2025. Snap Inc. internal data, 2025. ³ Snapchat reaches over 75% of the 13- to 34-year-old population in over 25 countries. Snap Inc. internal data Q1 2026. ⁴ In Q1, nearly 75% of U.S. Chat DAU viewed ads in Chat, and roughly one-third of Sponsored Snaps reach was unique to Chat. Snap Inc. internal data Q1 2026. ⁵ 971M global monthly active users and 493M daily active users. Snap Q2 2026 investor materials. investor.snap.com. Q2 2026. ⁶ More than 75% of Snapchatters are engaging with augmented reality daily on average, and the community uses AR Lenses in the Snapchat camera 9 billion times per day on average. Snap Inc. internal data Q1 2026. ⁷ Snapchatters who open Sponsored Snaps have strong intention to convert - 20% higher purchases per full-screen ad views (compared to ads in other inventories). Snap Inc. internal data, 2025. ⁸ 36M+ reached during KFC's First Snap Takeover (20 Wings for $20) for the 2026 Super Bowl. Snapchat for Business. https://forbusiness.snapchat.com. 2026. ⁹ 2.6X Increased Ad Awareness versus users exposed to one format. Snap Inc. internal data, 2025. ¹⁰ With the addition of Lower Funnel media and scaling budgets across Upper and Mid Funnel media in 1H 2025, Celebrity drove 7x increased site traffic and 9x increased bookings attributed to Snap vs. the same time last year. Snap Inc. internal data, 2025. ¹¹ The Snap Map reached over 450 million global monthly active users in Q1, reflecting strong continued engagement. Snap Inc. internal data Q1 2026. ¹² Carl's Jr.'s Promoted Places campaign drove a +6pt lift in Ad Awareness and +3pt lift in Brand Favorability as measured by Snap's Brand Lift solution. Snapchat for Business. https://forbusiness.snapchat.com. 2026. ¹³ Coles 360 and Cadbury used Snapchat Promoted Places to launch the Biscoff chocolate bar, driving a 30% lift in store visits, 324K incremental visits, and $0.31 cost per visit. Snapchat for Business. https://forbusiness.snapchat.com. 2025.

The Best Ad Format for Top-of-Mind Awareness With Digital Natives