Snapchat Integrates AI Agents to Revolutionize Advertising

Snapchat Introduces Conversational Advertising with AI Agents

Snapchat has recently introduced a new form of advertising that could transform how users interact with brands on the platform. Now, sponsored artificial agents are directly joining users' conversations. These brand-sponsored bots no longer just appear as banners or sponsored stories; they actively participate in discussions.

Last Tuesday, Snapchat announced the launch of “AI Sponsored Snaps,” an initiative that allows advertisers to place their own conversational agents at the heart of exchanges. Unlike traditional advertisements, these agents respond and guide discussions in real-time, offering a new dimension to advertising on the platform.

How Sponsored Agents Work

These sponsored agents function like ordinary conversational partners. Users can engage in conversation, ask questions, and receive answers that gradually guide them toward the products or services of the represented brand. For example, Experian, the first official partner, uses this assistant to address financial topics before offering commercial deals.

However, the added value for the user remains to be demonstrated. The responses provided by these agents are not fundamentally different from those of a general-purpose chatbot like Gemini or Claude, except that the primary goal is to generate revenue for the sponsoring brand. Snapchat seems to bet that users will engage with these bots without worrying about their neutrality.

A New Era for Advertising on Snapchat

Ajit Mohan, Snapchat's Chief Commercial Officer, explains that this initiative responds to an evolution in consumer behavior. According to him, "conversation is becoming the most valuable real estate in advertising." AI plays a crucial role in this transformation, making chat a place where users discover products, ask questions, and make decisions in real-time. The real opportunity lies in designing advertising formats that naturally integrate into existing discussions.

Snapchat is building on the success of My AI, its conversational assistant launched three years ago, which has already been used by more than half a billion people. Although the launch of My AI faced challenges, including inappropriate responses during tests conducted by journalists and researchers posing as teenagers, Snapchat appears confident in the potential of this new form of conversational advertising.