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Why do brands run social media contests? It’s simple. They get results.
A social media content can help to increase followers, leads, sales, reach, and engagement. It isn’t just for brand recognition.
Here are 5 reasons to run a social media contest for your brand that you may have not considered.
5 Reasons to Run a Social Media Contest
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Article Contents
IN THIS ARTICLE:
- Why social media contests effective for brands
- What permissions do you need to use UGC from a social media contest?
- How to reach customers with a social media contest
1. Social Media Contests Increase Sales of Your Top Selling Products
As an ecommerce brand or Shopify store, you likely have best-selling products are always nearly in high demand from your customers.
By using a social media contest, you can increase the popularity of these products.
A social media contest is also useful for increasing upsell purchases.
Fans are likely to spend more when they feel that they are already getting something for free (a chance to enter to win a prize in your social media contest).
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Don’t Forget to Educate Contest Participants About Your Products
Even though these are your top-selling products, don’t automatically assume that all of your contest participants are already familiar with them.
Instead, you should make sure that your contest campaign presents the features and benefits of the product to educate participants so that they can become customers.
2. User-Generated Content for Your Marketing Campaigns
A social media contest by definition aggregates user-generated content from your audience.
Social media contest participants submit their photos, videos or creative designs as the contest entries.
As a result, you’ll immediately have fresh content for your social media channel that you can use as social proof that consumers love your brand.
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What Rights Are Needed in Order for Brands to Use UGC?
Important: you need permission to use UGC from a social media contest!
Here’s what you should know:
Before you use any user-generated content in your marketing, including social media campaigns, make sure that you have obtained the necessary liability/publicity releases from your contest participants.
You should never assume that you automatically have the rights to use UGC just because it came from followers of your brand.
Whether the UGC is submitted to your websites, social media pages, mobile apps or via mail, you must obtain permission from the users who created the content.
If you plan to use UGC from your social media contest you will need to obtain the intellectual property and privacy rights to use the content from your contest participants.
A contest administrator can handle this task for you to ensure that you have all of the legal rights associated with every entry that you need.
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3. Get Testimonials and Product Reviews From Social Media Contests
Social media contests are the best way to get testimonials from your customers about your brand. Participants tend not to respond to customer surveys unless there is some kind of incentive.
To get testimonials, you have to ask.
However, if you’re doing so as part of a social media contest, it won’t be hard to get them because the chance to win a free prize is a very strong incentive.
That said, make sure to include in your social media contest official rules that submitting a testimonial will not increase an entrant’s chance of winning.
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This is required in order to protect your company and ensure that contest participants understand that your contest is fairly judged based on the criteria set forth for contest entries.
Namely, that contest entries are not judged on any other activities they may engage in during the promotion.
Using a social media contest is a creative way to get customer testimonials that many brands are not using.
Social Media Contests Turn Getting Authentic, Customer Testimonials into a Proven Process
If you run contests regularly, asking for a testimonial during the promotion can be turned into a simple and repeatable process. This ensure that you always have recent testimonials to display to your customers, helping to build trust and brand loyalty.
To ensure that you get high-quality testimonials, you need to make sure that you ask your participants the right questions. These questions help the customer to tell their stories, as well as, why they love your brand.
Here are a few examples of testimonial questions to ask:
- How did you first discover our brand?
- How did our product or service solve your problem?
- How has our product/service improved your life?
- What is one thing you enjoy most about our product/service?
- What would you say to a potential customer about our product/service?
- What features, advantages or benefits of our brand first attracted you to become a customer?
- How long have you been a customer? Used our product/service?
- If there is one word you could use that describes our brand, what would it be?
- What made you want to try the new/upgraded version of our product?
- What is your favorite variety of our product?
Don’t turn this into an in-depth interview.
Instead, choose one or two questions that will give your contest participants enough information to create testimonials that sound sincere but also don’t take more than a few minutes to write.
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4. Seasonal Holiday Contests Boost Leads and Sales
While it’s recommended that you run social media contests regularly in order to create viral traffic, season contest promotions also benefit brands.
Here are the key advantages of seasonal sweepstakes and contests:
- They attract attention to your brand
- They help boost sales for key sales periods.
- They help increase visibility for your brand during times when you are competing the most for the attention of your customers
- They help you nurture contest participants and turn them into customers.
- They boost profits during periods when your sales might otherwise be down.
- They increase margins by helping customers to spend more because they feel that they are getting something for free.
Follow These Tips for Effective Holiday Social Media Contests
Running a social media contest during the holidays makes your brand stand out if you do all of the following:
1. You Connect With Customer Sentiment During That Time of the Year
If your customers are stressed out or too busy which is common around the holidays, you need to connect with them to let them know that your brand gets it.
Position your social media contest so that it provides the relief and holiday cheer that your audience is looking for.
2. Find a Co-sponsor for Your Social Media Contest
Using a co-sponsor for your social media contest helps to increase the reach of your promotion. By presenting your brand to a new audience, you’ll be able to get followers, leads, and sales that your brand would not otherwise have access to.
If you are a smaller brand going up against larger competitors for your holiday promotions, a co-sponsor’s audience can give your promotion the extra edge it needs.
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3. Appeal to Repeat Customers
Contest participants are often your most loyal customers.
By showing your customers that you appreciate their long-term loyalty, they’ll be more likely to spend more with your brand, especially if you offer additional incentives to buy during your promotion.
An offer of a discount on their total purchase or a free gift with an order of a minimum value can boost sales.
Just to be clear, if your social media contest is actually a sweepstakes, you will also need to abide by No Purchase Necessary laws.
This is why it’s essential to work with a contest administration company to ensure that your promotion is legally compliant with all applicable contest or sweepstakes laws.
5. Social Media Contests Create Differentiation for Your Brand
Customers don’t always remember what you said about your brand, but they remember how you make them feel. By running social media contests regularly, you’ll have a way to differentiate your brand from the competition.
It’s not only in the promotional event itself, the prizes that you give away during a social media contest also have an impact on your customers.
By giving away unique contest prizes, such as vacations, branded merch or a year’s supply of your product, you’ll create a true brand experience that is different and gives people a reason to choose your brand.
Next Steps: Get Social Media Contest Quotes
Social media contests help boost your brand in several ways. However, to create an ROI-driven social media contest, you need to clearly define your goals.
Then look for social media contest quotes so that you can find a social media contest administrator for your campaign.
Looking for a social media contest platform to run you with your next promotion? Sweepsify helps you find top contest and sweepstakes companies in seconds. Create your free Premium account now to get started.
