Do you want to create a buzz around your business on social media platforms? Running a successful social media contest or giveaway is a great way to leverage more audience towards your profile. You can reach new audiences, grow your businesses, and make huge profits by running contests and giveaways from time to time. This concept is beneficial for all small businesses and start-ups who do not want to spend a fortune to promote themselves through digital marketing companies.
According to a survey, giveaways and contests work on social media, especially if your goal is to generate more social media followers, engagement and drive traffic. You can use these methods to increase followers who can turn into your potential customers. All you need to do is to learn how to properly host these contests and giveaways.
We have you covered. Here are some easy tips and strategies on how to run a successful social media contest or giveaway.
Define Your Goals
Any promotional activity you do for your business starts with defining your goals. Identify all your social media goals and objectives and design a contest around it so that it can explicitly support these goals.
The one-off contest you are planning to create should roll up to broader business goals. There is no point in putting so much hard work behind the contest if it doesn’t define your business or align with your goals.
Select the Right Social Media Platforms
To run a successful contest, you must understand your target audience. It can be done if you choose the right social media platform. Different platforms cater to different user behaviors and demographics.
- Figure out the gender, age, area, level of education, income, and other demographic information about the audience you want to reach through the contest.
- Try to determine their interests through hobbies, living choices, and their social media footprints.
- Find out the social media sites that your ideal customers visit most and interact with most persistently.
Once you have figured out the above-listed requisites, you can create the best contestant or giveaway to fit the likes and needs of your audiences.
Keep it Simple
No matter the type of content you design for the contest, one thing is important—to keep everything simple and straightforward.
Your contest should be easy to comprehend and action. Any complicated or unclear question will make people lose interest in the activity.
Keep an Impressive Prize
One of the best practices to ensure your contest will work is to focus on the prize you are offering. The reward should match what you are asking people to do. If you are asking for something easy, the reward should be small. On the contrary, if you are asking the entrants to perform complicated steps, like filling in personal information on an external website, you must make their effort worth it by rewarding them with a bigger prize.
Focus on the Time Frame
Nobody wants to engage in a contest or giveaway that is too extended. The audience will either not participate or leave the content in between.
Avoid this problem by setting a short time frame. Besides this, keep introducing a sense of urgency on all your contest-related posts as a gentle reminder for the audience.
Monitor the Contest
Once you have made the contest or giveaway live, it is crucial to monitor it to measure its success. At each step, you must track the number of people participating, ensure the rules are followed, manage interactions, and deal with any existing problems. You can consider the following check-points:
- Are the participants of the contest following the rules?
- Is the contest gaining engagement on every social media platform you promote?
- What is the quality of the submission?
- Is everything aligning with the theme of the brand?
- Is the contest getting negative feedback?
Depending on the kind of campaign you have created, you can add more considerations.
Different Types of Contest and Giveaway Ideas
Photo Contest
You can run a photo contest for your brand by asking the audience to share photos of how they use your products or services. The most creative or unique entry wins the prize. It is the easiest contest for the entrants to participate in.
Video Contest
You can ask the audience to create short-form videos like YouTube shorts or reels. Announce a theme and ask them to create unique and fun videos. The best efforts win the prize.
Like/Share/Comment
One of the easiest types of contests is to like/share/comment on the post. It works best with new and small businesses. You can also add a follow request to the contest to increase your followers.
Sign-Up Contest
Lastly, you can ask your potential customers to sign up with your website or become a subscriber on your channel. This contest works best for small business owners looking for opportunities to generate more leads.