A lot of people probably think we’re crazy for writing this.

After all, who publishes stuff about their company that people don’t like?

But, we’re gonna do it anyway, for a couple of reasons.  

First off, we’re pretty keen on a thing called radical transparency here at Mish. That being, openness about the things customers do and don’t like - and what we’re doing about them. There’s nothing more infuriating than feeling like you’re on your own with an issue once a company has sold you a product, or that your voice isn’t being heard.

And we’re not hiding away from those issues, because at the end of the day, it does neither one of us any favors.

Second of all, in the spirit of transparency, we want to make sure we’re not only learning ourselves as these issues come up, but sharing those learnings with you. Because as the great people at Slack say “Sharing isn’t just caring — it builds trust.”

We don’t hide any feedback or learnings internally, and we figured there was no reason to hide them externally, either.

So here are 3 things customers weren’t so crazy about with Mish - and what we’re doing to help solve them.

“Our brand’s focus has shifted to Instagram Stories.”

What you said:

This is one we’ve heard more and more in 2018, both from current and prospective clients. And, we get it. No hard feelings at all.

In fact, we totally agree that the landscape of ephemeral (disappearing) stories has changed. While it wasn’t always easy to hear that our product was built for a channel that some people weren’t prioritizing anymore, it was hugely valuable for us to understand how and why it was happening.

Here’s the thing.

Snapchat changed what it meant to tell real stories on social media, and shifted the way we consume and create content - for good. It’s vertical, it’s real, it’s in the moment. But that evolution meant other social media channels followed suit. Of course they did: the shift to ephemeral stories was too powerful not to.

Stories are on track to replace the newsfeed in 2019. And Instagram Stories just hit 400M daily active users.

So, while Snapchat is still the first choice for teens, we hear that some customers want to nail their brand metrics outside of this, and Instagram Stories are a force to be reckoned with.

What we’re doing:

We’ve been learning as much as we can about the Stories space over the last four years, and have prioritized the build of an Instagram Stories product that’s going to help you drive your brand objectives through more authentic storytelling.

We currently support publishing and scheduling for Instagram Stories. We’re on the cusp of releasing takeover support and the ability to receive and reuse user-generated content.

Shortly after, we’ll be adding linking and advanced analytics to the Instagram Stories product.

What does that mean? The ability to scale an authentic brand story on Instagram, using UGC to curate the stories your audiences are telling about you - making the conversation truly two way. It also means brand security, the ability to drive conversions, and really understand what’s working.

The Instagram Stories product is being released in stages, but if you’re keen to hear more (trust us, it’s good) you can get in touch with us here.

“Our reach on Snapchat has declined since the update.”

What you said:

This has been an interesting theme for us. Working so closely within Snapchat’s ecosystem for so long with all sorts of different brands, we can see that there’s been a shift here for some. Understanding the ins and outs of how and why that’s happening has been super important for us as a company to keep on top of.

What we’re doing:

We’re big believers in using data to understand what’s working and what’s not - especially when it comes to creative. When you told us there were some changes in reach since the update, we delved into the billions of data points we’ve amassed since 2014 to see what the story was (excuse the pun).

What we learned: authenticity matters, storytelling is still king, and we probably need to get a bit more hands-on with the vertical storytelling lessons we’ve learned to make sure the legends we work with are still getting results.

We also learned that the paid/organic mix on Snapchat is now pretty pivotal.

So, we’ve opened up services to clients - because as vertical storytelling specialists, we should be helping you more.

We’ve started working on creative strategy and content production with brands to boost their engagement, and media distribution to drive reach with Story Ads, in addition to their organic channel.

Helping clients with creative campaigns and their paid/organic mix on Snapchat - including running Story Ads - has helped us nail exactly what works in the new ecosystem. The conversion and ROI have been pretty exciting to date - AdWeek wrote a great article that mirrors our experience thus far.

If you want to chat to us about content creation, strategy, or Story Ads, let’s do it.

“I don’t have the resource to maintain yet another channel. It’s just not worth it, and I also want a freakin’ life.”

What you said:

Let’s address that last point head-on: you deserve to just have a freakin’ life anyway. We don’t want to add to that problem.

But, a bunch of customers told us that by investing in a software for Snapchat (and now Instagram Stories), it meant that there had to be a content marketing strategy to justify it. And that meant content creation - LOTS of content creation.

The fact is, the volume of content you need to make your content marketing strategy work is way too much for your team to produce. Way, way too much.

So, we figured we’d help you scale your content team instead.

What we’re doing:

Scaling your content team quickly means curating the stories your customers are telling about you - on the channels they’re already creating content.

Received content capture means that you can save, repurpose and repost content from your audiences - and manage influencer takeovers more easily with our Autoforward function. That means no giving out passwords, ever.

What we heard from clients tapping into this was that it saved them about 3 hours per day, and that their Stories were more authentic - which is powerful, because content from your customers has been found to get up to 6.9x more engagement than brand content.

Content capture on Snapchat is no new thing for our platform. What's really exciting will be bringing Instagram Stories in line, meaning Mish Guru will serve as a content library for two channels. At once. You’ll be able to run UGC and influencer takeovers all day long.

Time to reclaim your life, friends.

Thank you.

Most importantly, we want to say thank you for feeding back the stuff you haven’t enjoyed as much about Mish. We’re on a mission to build out the world’s most powerful, full-service suite for vertical video channels, and the feedback you give us is an absolutely key part of making that happen.

It’s a reminder to us that nothing’s ever perfect, and that we can always do better. Which keeps us innovating and pushing to improve. Thanks so much for helping us out, and taking the time to talk to us about things that aren’t working.

If there’s anything we’ve missed, please feel free to get in touch.

That radical transparency thing means we’ll probably do another one of these posts soon as we keep learning more ways to serve you better.

To great storytelling (and beyond)

- Team Mish

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