5 Tips for Launching an Awesome Contest

Creating and running a contest will help your business to make new sales and also increase your followers and customer loyalty. The contest will give you important information about who your target audience is and what they want. You can use this information for future sales and promotions.

1. Set a Goal
In order to create your contest, your first step should be to identify the reason for your contest and what you want to achieve. The contest should accomplish a specific goal for your business such as collecting content from your target audience, getting new subscribers to your newsletter list or selling a product or service. Identify tools that will help you to measure the results of the contest.

2. Decide on the Contest Type
Find the contest type that is best suited for your business and goals and pick a prize that will entice your audience. The prize should be relevant to your business. This is important because you want to attract people who are interested in your business, not just interested in winning a prize. Popular contest types include video-vote, photo-vote, sweepstakes and caption. Sweepstakes are the easiest to enter. If you want to collect content from users, your best options are the video-vote and photo-vote contests. The tools you use for the contest should make it easy for people to share it and should be mobile friendly.

3. Decide on the Length of Your Contest
If you want to give away small prizes, you can do a weekly promotion. For larger prizes, such as a vacation trip, allow more time for people to register so that you can get as many entries as possible. Establish contest rules and indicate the start and end times of your contest along with the time zone. Remember to include this information in your promotions.

4. Determine Your Contest Rules
In your contest rules, include all the relevant data about your contest such as how and when the winner will be selected and announced, the amount of entries needed for the prize to be given away and how the winner will be notified. Also, include what will happen if the winner does not claim the prize by a certain date, or cases in which the winner forfeits the prize. Indicate whether contestants need to be a certain age, gender, or live in a certain location to enter.

5. Optimize Your Entry Page
Creating a professional looking entry page can make a big difference in the amount of entries you receive. The look of the page should reflect the purpose of the contest and represent your business with elements such as your business logo and your colors. For best results, also limit the amount of information you collect to the name, email address and age of the contestant. Promote your contest on social media with one or two hashtags, send it out to your newsletter list, or try doing paid advertisements.

After your contest is over, evaluate what worked and what didn’t and make adjustments for the future.