Idea: Multiple thumbnails for each person’s Snapchat Story to preview friends’ Story content, help inspire why to view full Story, & still show Story chronologically (#10)

View Stories, tap on Person 1’s Story, tap through to Person 1’s fourth story, then swipe down to return to the Stories page. The four viewed Story thumbnails animate opacity down, and then those four thumbnails animate to the left. Designed by D.J. Sherrets.

Snapchat today:

• Snapchat Stories currently show one circle thumbnail, with some part of the thumbnail removed to indicate how much time is left to view the thumbnail.
• Showing any thumbnail on Stories was a change for Snapchat at launch because before there was no preview for messages sent to you directly.
• An advantage of no other clear thumbnails than one is that the Story can be a surprise to see what people view.
• Sometimes people don’t visit Stories by a particular person without knowing that the content might have been interesting to view.
• A strength for Snapchat is the focus on picking a person to view their Story chronologically. There’s an opportunity to get more of a preview to what the Story is about, while still with a clear reason to tap through to view.

Proposed idea:

1. View Stories page. Tap on the Story by Person 1.
2. Person’s Story 1 of 7 opens. Tap for next story.
3. Person’s Story 2 of 7 opens. Tap for next story.
4. Person’s Story 3 of 7 opens. Tap for next story.
5. Person’s Story 4 of 7 opens. Swipe down to return to Stories page.
6. Opacity goes down for the thumbnails representing the first 4 stories by Person 1, then those 4 thumbnails move to the left off the screen, leaving the 3 more thumbnails of Story posts by Person 1 that have not been viewed yet.

Comments:

• Enabling people to see more thumbnails even if still small is a great opportunity to highlight some of the content made in each Story.
• Important to consider impact of showing thumbnails on what people post to Stories, such as if people posting feel they need to care about what thumbnail appears. Of course, preferably people don’t think about the thumbnails because a strength of Snapchat is that people feel comfortable posting their day.
• Consider making some thumbnails animated to include some part of the videos, though probably not to require tapping to open to view the videos.
• This idea preserves the idea of people opting to view content and so the idea of who viewed the content being meaningful is preserved. Story content still appears chronologically, and circular thumbnails appear chronologically.
• Opportunity is to increase viewing of Stories because the thumbnails may help people see why to check out a Story.

Tap on Person 1 Story, tap next, tap next…

…tap next, then swipe down to return to Stories even though there are still 3 more Stories left to view posted by Person 1…

…opacity was reduced for the thumbnails of the 4 Story posts that had been viewed already, then those 4 Story post thumbnails animate to the left leaving the 3 thumbnails of the Story posts that have not been viewed yet.

© 2016 D.J. Sherrets