Hosting cost-free contests on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest
Free: It’s one of the best four-letter words in the English lexicon. When people see it, their interest is immediately sparked. And it gets even better when that something free is tied into a contest. Not only is there a prize involved, but there’s also a win.
Every day,hundreds of businesses tap into the psychology of winning and getting something for free. And they do it through social media contests.
Take BMW, for example. The venerable German automaker put out a call on Facebook late last year, looking for its No. 1 fan. In addition to the title, ultimate fandom would be awarded with a free trip to Munich. Millions entered, a winner was chosen and every hit on Facebook garnered BMW a little more face time with potential customers.
The problem for small business owners is that promising an all-expense paid trip probably isn’t in the budget. With the advice of UnBounce.com and others, however, there are plenty of ways to host an online contest without spending a dime.
Pinterest, Twitter and Facebook all serve as great platforms for a variety of contests, and the only cost involved is the time required to create them. As for the prize, a small business may need to get collaborative to entice participation if in-house products don’t seem applicable. To do so, small business owners can talk to neighboring businesses or channel partners to see if they’ll donate an item in exchange for a piece of the promotion.
Once a business finds a prize partner, the next step is choosing the style of contest. And that’s where UnBounce.com comes into play once again. Here are a few ideas to set the wheels in motion:
On Pinterest
- Pin it to win it – where people pin or repin an image from your site to get an entry
- Pinning sweepstake – where you decide what is to be pinned and users let you have the link to enter a sweepstakes contest
- Photo contest – where followers have to pin an image around a theme
- Comments – where followers comment on your image and you choose a winner at random
- Likes and repins – where users create a board under guidelines and the winner is the person with the most likes or repins
On Twitter
- Verbal contests – such as those where you have to fill in the blanks, complete a phrase or answer a question.
- Sweepstakes contests – where you tweet or retweet something to enter a draw.
- Retweet to win – like a sweepstake, you would randomly choose a winner, this time from the list of people who retweeted you – it has virality built right in.
On Facebook
- Sweepstakes – make sure you use a Facebook app to prevent getting burned by their strict rules (not to mention the rules governing sweepstakes in different countries and U.S. states). WildeFireApp is great at setting up sweepstakes on Facebook.
- Photo and video contests – posting and sharing photos for likes and comments
- Polls and quizzes – where users answer the question and leave comments
To get help getting a social media contest off the ground for your company, feel free to reach out to the team at NetSphere Strategies. We’d be happy to help because after all, it might just be a win-win.
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