Social media is, without a doubt, one of the best ways to grow your business in 2020. A stunning 3.81 billion people use social media across all platforms, making it essential for building your lead list and spreading brand awareness.
Online giveaways often go hand in hand with social media because of the freedom and flexibility offered to business owners and marketers across all industries. Essentially, the goal of a social media giveaway is to encourage more users to check out your website, subscribe to your email list and buy a product from your online store.
In this article, I explore some of the best practices you should keep in mind. Our tips will help you craft an engaging and effective contest designed to help you grow your business.
Let's get started!
Create contests for your audience segments
The first thing you have to keep in mind when creating a giveaway is your target audience. If your goal is to attract more visitors that fit your ideal customer persona, you should make sure the prize, theme and language all speak to specific segments.
For example, if someone wanted to attract more visitors to their e-commerce storefront that sells gardening supplies, they would offer a prize that benefits their target audience, such as a starter kit. The target audience in this example is the new gardeners who need help getting started.
When you strategically pick the segment you want to target, you have a much better chance of increasing sales and engagement long term. Believe it or not, 76% of people made a purchase after reading a brand's social media post. The more your content resonates with your audience, the better chance you will have at getting people to engage with your brand on social media.
Allow for multiple entries
One interaction via a contest entry is excellent for engagement, but allowing multiple entries can significantly boost your return on investment. Normally, consumers will enter a brand contest, then not bother going back to their profile or website until the winner is announced.
Adding multiple entry methods can open new ways to communicate so you can keep in touch with prospects, regardless of their stage in the buying cycle. Let's say you add one entry method that asks the user to follow your Twitter account. Once they click the Like button, you can open a second option that allows for a second entry if they sign up for your email list.
If the person is genuinely interested in what you're offering, they will sign up and enter a second time. Now you can send exclusive content, your best content, and more to your new subscribers. You don't have to wait for participants to come back to your website, now you can contact them through your email marketing campaign.
Add images and video
Images and videos will help you reach a broader audience. Social media platforms like Pinterest, Instagram, and YouTube thrive off of visual content. Your target audience is likely included in 1.9 billion monthly YouTube users, so diversifying your contests with videos is a must.
You could choose to do a video where you tell users about your company and the contest prize. Alternatively, you can encourage subscribers to create their own videos and images, and send them in as part of the contest. Plenty of folks get invested in contests that allow them to flex their creative muscles. As a result, you'll see more engagement between your customers as people share and comment on their favorite creations.
Besides the obvious benefit of spreading brand awareness, videos, and images will also help people make a buying decision on your website. Research shows that 55% of consumers use video as an inspiration when buying new products. If someone stumbles across a visually appealing giveaway on social media, they could end up on your website and becoming a customer without entering your giveaway. It's a win-win situation.
Work with partner brands
Marketers often struggle with promoting their giveaway when they don't have many followers. One smart way you can still get your event out to a broad audience is by working with partner brands.
Browse the social media platforms where you want to promote a giveaway. Look for other businesses that are in a similar industry, but offer a different product. For example, an email marketing firm might partner with a web hosting brand.
Work out a deal where you offer something to the other company, like a guest post for their blog, a review copy of their product or even just a social media shoutout. After you come to an agreement, create a separate link to your landing page to track how much traffic is coming from the partner promoting your giveaway.
You're going to find that some partner companies can yield massive results, while others are lackluster. Take your time easing into a partnership like this to make sure that the arrangement is mutually beneficial to you and the other team involved.
Use features offered by each platform
Each social media platform comes jam-packed with features you can use to promote your event. You can mix and match the best strategies across multiple platforms.
When you want to promote your event on Twitter, you would use hashtags related to your industry and target audience. You can add multiple hashtags to cast a net that will reach everyone that browses the categories you choose. If you know your target audience's pain points, interests and hobbies, this one change can drastically improve your contest engagement.
If you wanted to promote that same content to Facebook, you might consider looking for groups that focus on your industry and post your event for consumers that are already interested in the product or service you offer. There are hundreds of thousands of groups with millions of daily active users. You can reach your audience on Facebook through this feature, but you may have to look for the biggest, niche-specific group.
Instagram Stories are extremely popular and known for helping businesses make product announcements. You can even host a story to announce the winner of your contest at the end. Instagram users love the fact that they can essentially engage with the face of their favorite brand.
While many social media platforms focus on engagement, each offers its own set of tools you can use to make your giveaway a bit more useful. You can find specific traits about each social media page by spending time browsing and becoming an active user.
Back to you
There you have it. We have looked at several tips you should consider if you're thinking about using social media giveaways to grow your business. You can implement one or all of these tips the next time you want to attract a broad audience, get your followers excited about a new product or give something back to your community.
The most important thing you should remember is viral giveaways are not something you'll master overnight. Don't feel discouraged if you hold a couple of events and don't get much traffic. Feel free to experiment with different color patterns, images, and prizes. There are plenty of flexible options at your disposal. You just have to reach out and get started.