Daily Reads: Snapchat Soars, Facebook the Conqueror, and the World’s Best B-Schools

This is the first of a regular feature from the Center for Auto Finance Excellence cluing you in to interesting reads, data and insights that will help you do a better job as an auto finance professional. We hope you find Daily Reads valuable.

An Advertiser’s Dream

Snapchat continues to make its case as an advertiser’s dream platform. A report from ComScore shows that in the highly-coveted 18-24 demographic, Snapchat has smartphone penetration on 50% of devices. Similarly, Snapchat is currently the third-most popular social media app for millennials (18-34), trailing Facebook (75.6%) and Instagram (43.1%) — higher than well-established social media platforms like Twitter, Google+, and Pinterest. Snapchat users represent an untapped market for auto lenders — a generation eager to purchase cars (or eventually purchase cars), but who might not be familiar with auto financing.

Feel the Buzz

The Awl published a fascinating look today at Buzzfeed’s recently disclosed, massive $850 million valuation and the $50 million capital injection it got from Andreessen Horowitz, the venture capital firm. Buzzfeed hosts more than 150 million unique visitors each month, and the majority of them get to Buzzfeed through Facebook. The message in the valuation is clear: Facebook remains the behemoth of web traffic — and, by extension, online consumer advertising. When it comes to online (and now mobile) advertising, auto lenders just can’t ignore Facebook. As Buzzfeed knows.

B-School

Business Insider recently published a list of the world’s top business programs. Harvard University, Stanford University, and the University of Pennsylvania were the top three schools on the list. International schools like London School of Economics (8), London Business School (9), Oxford (13), and INSEAD (15) all ranked in the top 15. Now you know which resumes to review — and which to ignore.