If your business is aiming to leverage the social power of Facebook to build your brand or improve sales and you haven’t utilised a competition, you’re missing out. There are few strategies that can generate as much activity for your Facebook page as a well planned and executed competition.

This Mashable article outlines the following four great reasons to hold a competition on Facebook:

• Building your fan base
• Engage your audience
• They are a rich source of data
• Consumers do your marketing for you

These are indeed some of the major benefits that come from running a competition but the key to getting the most out of your contest and achieving these outcomes lies in how the competition is set up and run.

Understanding what you can and can’t do

Facebook has some very strict guidelines surrounding promotions on pages and before you start delving into contests it’s definitely worth familiarising yourself with their page guidelines, in particular the Promotions section. It’s really important to abide by these guidelines as there have been some cases where pages have been shut down for running promotions that breach theses rules. Scary.

What type of competition am I going to run?

There are three common types of promotions that are run:

• Sweepstakes (Like our page to go in the draw)
• Photo contest (Upload your favourite photo with our brand)
• Voting (Vote for your favourite .....)

It’s really important to choose the most relevant or applicable style of contest for your brand/product and marketing objectives otherwise it won’t have the optimum impact. For example, a law firm running a photo contest (“Upload a photo of your favourite subpoena!”) probably won’t have the same impact as a travel agent asking for pictures of fans favourite locations.

Make the prize attractive

The most important factor in the whole promotion is the prize. This is where there has to be an investment in order to see the best results. The ideal prize would be something relevant to the page/brand, or one of its more desirable products. Can’t think of anything suitable? Cash prizes make everyone happy.

Create airtight terms and conditions

Aside from the Facebook promotion guidelines, online casino as with any promotion it’s important to put together a comprehensive terms and conditions document. This should cover:

• The process of entering the promotion
• The details of the prize
• The dates the contest will run
• The announcement of winners and claiming the prize
• The collection and use of any information (e.g. further marketing purposes)

Make sure people know about it

It’s all well and good having a killer contest but if there is no promotion surrounding it then it will be a waste of time and money no matter how cool the prize.
Generally it is recommended that the contest is supported by a Facebook advertising campaign that is aimed at your page/brands relevant target market. Also promote the contest across any other marketing platforms available, whether that be on your website, e-newsletter or on other social media.

While Facebook competitions can be incredibly effective they need to be implemented well, and within the promotion guidelines in order to reap the full rewards. That is where we can help!

If you are interested in running a Facebook competition for your business, contact us today and we can design and implement a contest to suit your marketing objectives.