One of the best ways to increase your social media following is to host a contest. Doing so can stimulate engagement and drive traffic to your social media profile. The moat important thing to do uniformly across the social media spectrum is to keep your audience engaged. Interact with them and create scenarios in which they can participate in conversation or whatever activity you are pushing.
People love contests because by simply following a profile or clicking a thumbs up button on a picture, they are entered to win something for FREE. For such little effort, they could win a really sweet prize. Sometimes a contest requires you to follow the profile and then tag 3 friends in the comment section in order for you to be entered in a drawing to win a pretty big item. This is a win-win for all involved. It takes them 10 seconds or less of minimal to zero effort for a chance to win a plasma tv but that follow adds up and those friends tagged in the comments can also follow you for a shot at the prize. You can even follow up with those tagged friends later to gain more followers or potential customers.
All in all, hosting a contest takes little effort on your part because you are most likely giving away some of your own products or services. Don’t worry if you end up having to buy bigger ticket items for an online contest because it will be worth every penny. A few bucks up front on a nice prize will prove it’s weight in gold when your social media platforms are bursting with new followers and potential customers. While there is no limit (except your own imagination) on what kind of contests you can run, let’s take a look at the few major ones existing in the social media space these days.
Types Of Contests You Can Run On Social Media
Photo Contests – These are really unique because of how effective they are. It’s essentially free marketing. In order for people to win an amazing prize, they have to post a photo on social media about them using the product and then tag your company and use hashtags associated with your contest. Sure, you are getting more followers but the key factor here is exposure. By sharing pictures of your product with your company hashtags, these individuals are marketing for you for FREE and the essence of word-of-mouth marketing truly takes off.
Sharing the photo on their social media accounts exposes it everyone they are connected to, who in turn may do it themselves and share it on their social media where another person sees it and decides to try their hand at the contest and so on and so forth until the contest ends. Talk about a turn out!
The most important thing about your photo contest will be the prize. It has to be enticing enough to get people motivated to go the extra step and post pics with your products. You don’t have to spend an insane amount of money but remember that it should be something of high quality to attract more interested parties.
Caption Contests – These can be a ton of fun! Essentially, you post a photo and ask people to submit their best caption for it. Usually you will get such an array of crazy and hilarious answers that it can be a riot simply reading through them! This is the easiest of the interactive contests because they only need to submit a response in the comments section.
Vote Contests – Think of the traditional “submit your vote” contests. This is where you have multiple items, or choices, and people vote on which one they like the best. For instance, which Golden Girl was your favorite? You can ask about anything really.
It can be simple or complex depending on what you want them to vote on and how. Across social media, sometimes the votes are dissected into comments, likes, loves, etc. but you can always just keep it simple and have everyone voice their opinion in the comments section. What is neat is that you can glean valuable information by watching how everyone approaches the questions. You can get ideas for future content you can create or even develop a case study off of the answers. Information is always priceless!
Giveaways – This is by far the most popular, easiest and most effective contest in play across social media right now. The person simply needs to enter for a chance to win the coveted prize you are offering. They can enter their name and email address or follow your social media account and “like” the picture. Some even take it a step further and request a follow, a “like” and to tag a certain amount of friends in the comments section. This increases the chance of connecting with more people, having the picture shared in more places and opening the door for potential sales interactions.
Video Contests – Because of the effort needed for this type of contest you shouldn’t expect a lot of people to enter. This is where, in order to be eligible to win the big prize, a user has to submit a video submission about whatever you decide – you, your product, their habits as a consumer, etc. Even though your entries will be lower than another type of contest, the QUALITY of these submissions will be pretty stellar. You might even be able to turn these videos into promo pieces down the line. FYI – this type of contest tends to attract budding filmmakers so you can expect to be wowed.
There are so many different types of contests that are run on social media platforms but these few examples are some of the most effective ways to accomplish more traffic and larger followings. A contest is whatever you make of it because it is simply a means to accomplish your goals and to show your appreciation for your consumers. Be original and don’t be afraid to tweak these examples to find the right fit for you and your brand.
Above all else, BE GENUINE. Don’t simply run a contest to collect names for your email marketing campaign and then spam everyone with pushy sales messages. You will get more traffic and followers because of the contest but show your love for your product and how much you appreciate those that follow you. Do it to give back, not to fatten your bottom line. You will end up with a more loyal following in the long run.
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