Market Your Business with a Contest
In the second of our series of marketing campaign ideas, we are looking at the idea of marketing through running a contest. This age-old technique plays on the idea that people can win something of value for a relatively low cost, for free or with a little effort. This type of marketing is ideal for a wide variety of target markets and demographics as the prize you offer will be what dictates who you are targeting. It is also a great way to get your existing customers to market your products or services to friends.
There are three main types of competition and these are:
- Buy/Spend “X” and be entered into the contest
- Great for business to business marketing
- Useful for increasing existing customer spend
- Useful for promoting a new or clearance product
- Free to enter contest
- Great for brand awareness
- Great for attracting new customers
- Great for word of mouth
- Perform an action contest
- Great within certain demographics such as children, depending on the action required
- Great for attracting new customers
- Great for word of mouth
The techniques below will cover methods for each of these contest types and so you can judge for yourself what type of competition would suit your business best.
Define the Goal(s)
What do you want your contest to achieve? For some, it may simply be attracting more customers or promoting a specific product. Others may want to grow their engagement on social media or their overall brand awareness. It is important to define what you want to achieve in the beginning as this will have a big bearing on the methods you use both for entries and promotion of the contest.
The Prize
This is a key point of your contest. If the prize is not sufficient then it won’t create enough buzz around the contest to make it effective. You should also remember that your prize should be something your target customers value. If you offer a prize which everyone would love (e.g. a holiday), then you will get entrants and interest from people who have no intention of ever being your customer. For example, if you run a plumbing company and offer a cash prize, you will likely get lots of students entering – students tend not to need plumbing companies or at least aren’t the ones who choose the company.
So, make the prize your own products or services (or a voucher for your company) unless you have a really wide target audience.
How to Enter
Making it easy to enter ensures that you can reach a wider audience and so it is a good idea to simply have an easy question and then supply you with their name, phone number, and email address. It is important for the entrants to know that you may use this information for marketing purposes and include an option to opt-out of marketing material – this is important and you need to respect people’s wishes in this regard. Most will not opt-out but those who do tend to be very annoyed if they subsequently receive a promotional text or email!
The Build-Up
Your contest should have a start and end date for entries. Limiting the time period tends to encourage people to enter there and then rather than leaving it on the long finger. It also creates a buzz and gives you the opportunity to have a Prize Draw event which people may attend at your premises if you have one.
Within your premises, you should have promotional signage which makes sure your existing customers are aware of it. Use leaflets to give more information about what is on offer and how to enter which can be taken and given to others. If you have social media accounts then you need to share a graphic or video about the contest.
Promoting a contest on social media
It is important to know that social media companies have certain rules about running contests on their platforms. Be sure to check that you don’t break those rules – some platforms allow you to use a contest format set by the platform. It is good to encourage people to comment on your contest post but this should not be a requirement to enter. Their action of commenting ensures that a good number of their friends/followers will see that they have entered and this encourages viral growth of the contest.
Run a small social media ad campaign to promote the competition post too and engage people who do not already follow your page/profile. If you have a nice graphic or video about the competition, it is very straight-forward to simply “Boost this post” (Facebook and Instagram) and there are step by step instructions on how to do that when you click “Boost this Post”. You don’t need to spend a lot here but a couple of dollars per day will add to the promotion. Make sure to limit the ad to the area your potential customers live though!
Other Promotional Methods
You can combine a competition with our direct mail campaign method from last week to add extra impetus and this combination is a great way of ensuring people really look at the leaflet delivered.
Taking out a small local newspaper advertisement is also a useful way to get people interested who may not hear about the competition otherwise. This is especially useful if you are planning to have an event on the day of the competition ending.
The Prize Draw
If at all possible, make the prize draw into a public event. You can do this a number of ways. If you have a premise then it is best to do it there. However, if you don’t, you can still have an event in a local bar, community center or other public premises – of course, you need to discuss this with that business’s owner.
Get some promotional banners or even inflatable signs made to really make the event stand out.
Depending on your business type, you can hire some local musicians, face painters or similar to really make the event attract people. In general, it is better NOT to make attendance at the event a necessity as that limits the entrants. The event should aim to have the draw within half an hour of the event beginning. This ensures that people are not irritated by waiting around. It also helps to have some staff on hand to talk to people and engage them with your business as some will likely be unfamiliar with what you do.
After the Prize Draw
Ensure you have got pictures of the prize draw event and of the contest winners. Ask the winners for permission to post their picture on social media and talk to them about what the prize means to them, what they will use it for etc so that you have a story to use.
With all of the new contact information you have received, create a special offer to send an email/text saying “Sorry you didn’t win but as a consolation prize, you can have X% discount when you mention the contest.” You can also post this message on social media.
This follow up tends to be the most effective part of the contest so make sure you do it!
Not sure if this is for you? Why not start with a smaller contest and leave out the prize draw event. This will cut down the cost for you and with a smaller contest and prize you can see if it gives you the kind of return you would like to see before expanding it.