Student organizations and UF are using Snapchat to promote on-campus events and changes.
Millie Llanes, the executive producer of Gator Growl, said the organization created a filter through the picture-based application for Gator Growl. The filter, which is available until Friday, is only available on Turlington Plaza, but students will have other filters to choose from during the event Friday.
“One of our biggest goals is to be as interactive as possible,” Llanes said.
The filter was created by a director of art and layout for Gator Growl and Homecoming, and it was approved by UF’s administration, Llanes said.
The social media team at UF’s Office of University Relations helps different groups on campus with social media outreach, which can be anything from Snapchat, Twitter or Facebook, said Robbie Smith, the multimedia specialist for UF Media Relations.
“Overall, (creating the filter) is not a painful process,” he said.
When any group, organization or department reaches out to the team, Smith said they discuss what they want to promote and how to do that across multiple platforms. The social media team’s service is free and open to anyone, Smith said. Smith said he’s created filters for study abroad fairs and Weeks of Welcome events at UF.
“We are happy to help anyone that wants to take advantage of those platforms,” Smith said.
There are two different kinds of filters Snapchat provides: community and on-demand, Smith said. Community filters cannot have any brand images and are free to submit but can take longer to get approved than on-demand filters, which are paid for and last through a specific time period.
Diana Dombrowski, the digital scholarship associate for Library West, met with Smith over Summer to discuss the best way to promote the library now being open 24/7.
Dombrowski said they talked about distinctive features of the building, and they settled on creating a Snapchat filter, which shows a sun and moon over an image of the library. It received an almost-unanimous vote by staff.
Dombrowski chose the geolocation on a map and set the time available down to the minute, she said. The filter at Library West is an on-demand filter, which cost $226 to put on for 10 days. As of Thursday morning, it had 780 uses on photos and was viewed 21,400 times, Dombrowski said.
“I think it’s gorgeous, and with the sun and the moon, it’s so easy to tell exactly what it’s referencing,” Dombrowski said.
She said she wants students to be aware of the library’s social media, through which upcoming news and events are posted.
If successful, she said the library could end up using the app to promote future events.
Llanes said creating filters for Homecoming Week was a long time coming. After Gator Growl wasn’t able to get approval from Snapchat for filters last year, she said they started working earlier this year to secure them.
“With the way social media is going right now, we really wanted to be interactive with students, and Snapchat filter is something that’s come out of left field,” she said.
