Taco Bell Just Snapchatted A Bunch Of Customers

Taco Bell has become the first major brand to venture into the latest social media darling: Snapchat.

Yesterday the fast food chain tweeted that fans should follow it on the app, which allows people to send pictures that self-destruct in 10 seconds, for a fun surprise.

The message? An announcement that it was reintroducing the Beefy Crunch Burrito.

"People are obsessed with Beefy Crunch Burrito so Snapchat seemed like the right platform to make the announcement," Taco Bell director of social and digital Tressie Lieberman told Mashable. "Sharing that story on Snapchat is a fun way to connect with the fans that we are thrilled to have. It’s all about treating them like personal friends and not consumers."

While many can't help speculate that Snapchat is a sexting tool, this promotion shows that it can be a useful marketing tool as well.

But even though Taco Bell was the first major company to experiment with the medium, New York-based frozen yogurt chain 16 Handles was Snapchatting back in January.

If consumers Snapchatted 16 Handles a photo of themselves sampling a yogurt flavor, they would then receive the photo of a coupon anywhere from 16% to 100% off. (The only catch: Show it to the cashier before the 10 seconds runs out.)

Delta Lingerie also did a campaign on Facebook's Snapchat competitor, Poke, to promote an underwear sale.

Daniel Barak, who worked on the Grey Tel Aviv campaign, told Business Insider that "In order to bypass the fact that Poke isn't opened to Brands, we sent the Pokes to the model's fans through her agent's personal Facebook profile." They then sent it to 40 friends at a time.