When Facebook-owned Instagram announced a product earlier this week that bears astrikingresemblance to Snapchat Stories, many users rolled their eyes.But there's a surprising group of people who areparticularly excited about the new development: Snapchat stars.Like Vine, YouTube, and Instagram, Snapchat has a group of mega-popular, homegrown stars who make big-bucks by working with brands.They'll do account take-overs for companies like Burger King or Walmart or get paidto create original, sponsored content on their own feeds.But Snapchat doesn't make life easy for creators. The app doesn't have auser suggestion page or aneasy way to share Snaps, soit's difficult for stars to grow their audiences or go "viral" in the typical sense.Instagram, however, has a"discovery" portal that features regular users instead of just publishers and events, as well as amore straightforward searchinterface. Plus, there are more brandsalready using it.For the handful ofbig Snapchatters Business Insider talked to, Instagram's copycat Stories product look so far like a big, potentially lucrative opportunity that they can't wait tostart toying with.Why they're excitedRight now,Snapchatter Mike Platcohas about 10,000 followers on Instagram,a trivial numbercompared to theaudience of~300,000he has amassedonSnapchat thanks to his creative drawings andgoofy antics.But now that he can bring his Snapchat charms to Instagram Stories, he's excited to start trying to build that audience upwhilehopefully porting over the kind ofclients he already has. He thinks the similarities will be an advantage: healready specialize in creating content in the non-static, creative format that he thinks brands will be looking for."I'm really excited to start experimenting with it, to see if it has the legs to be another great spot for cool stuff to live," he says of Instagram Stories.Snapchatter Branden Harvey agrees and says he's already starting totalk to his Snapchat clients about Instagram Stories. Instagram has manymore users (brands and regular people alike) thanSnapchat: 500 million monthly active users vs ~100 million daily active users.Harvey himselfdoesn't expect to stop creating Snapchat Stories,but he does thinkInstagram's new product could affect the amount of new "influencers" joining."I've had a few friends who are influencers who were thinking of jumping onto Snapchat who texted me and said, 'Whelp, now I don't have to join,' " he says. "I don't thinkbrands or influencerswith existing platforms on Snapchat will abandon ship, but I think people who were on the edge about joining Snapchat will think, 'We don't need a presence here.'"Cyrene Quiamco, who quit her job last fall to focus on Snapchat full-time, says that her frustration with the app'slack of discovery for users like her has eyeing Instagrameagerly. She's not planning to abandon SC,but if Instagram caters more to creators... who knows'"It's all up for grabs," shesays. "I'm up for grabs."Nick Cicero,the CEO of creator-network company Delmondo, says thatbrands he's talked to so far are into it. Many will still want to chase the specific audience that Snapchat has more ownership over, but there are a lot of advantages to trying the same kind of content on Instagram."Instagram has a much more defined ad tool, audience data, analytics, and API,"he says. "There are a lot of brands that have already grown really large Instagram audiences. Now they can turn on Stories and create that same live-ish content."SEE ALSO:Snapchat employees had some hilarious reactions to Instagram's 'copycat' productSEE ALSO:Meet the Snapchat stars who quit their day jobs and now make eye-popping amounts of moneyJoin the conversation about this storyNOW WATCH: How to find Pokmon in 'Pokmon Go
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