Shortly after purchasing Vine, Twitter announced that the app, home of the looping six second video clip, will soon be no more. Such is the nature of the savage social media landscape: some platforms just don’t last very long. Industry insiders are already speculating about where Vine stars are going to go next – so far Snapchat seems to be the destination of choice – but in the meantime, if you’ve got content you’ve created and stored on Vine, including any Vines you made to promote your business, the time to retrieve and save these short video clips is now. Twitter has said that Vine will continue to function as an archive space, but given that Twitter’s own future seems far from certain, you may not want to rely on that assurance.

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One way to save your Vines is by downloading them directly to your computer. Another way to save your Vines is to convert them into GIF files. GIFs are repeating animated files that are popular content to share on social media; you’ve seen them on Facebook. GIPHY has let it be known that Vine users can import their accounts and have all of their Vines converts into GIF files. This may be an option well worth exploring, particularly if you use your Vines regularly in your content mix.

Brands who have built a following on Vine, either on their own or through collaboration with an influential Viner, will definitely lose some reach as a result of the platform’s closure. It’s understandable that you want to start rebuilding somewhere else immediately, but we’d urge you to exercise a little caution. Before you rush to the next big thing, it’s good to see what the next big thing actually is. Before you commit to developing a presence on a new platform, you want to be sure it has some staying power. Snapchat currently seems like the logical next step for displaced Viners, but that situation could change in the weeks and months to go. Don’t be afraid to ask your current followers where they’re planning to go next – considering you want to wind up where they, this information can simplify your decision making exponentially.