by Guest Contributor | Aug 24, 2022 | Articles
Everybody loves a good contest.
But have you ever thought about using contests to grow your business and drive revenue?
Running contests for customers and prospects provides a fun and rewarding way to boost engagement, drive brand awareness and generate new leads. It’s something that could set you apart from the competition.
Maybe you want to run a contest but feel your industry or niche isn’t fun? We get it. Inventory aging dashboard and pyspark API might not be the most exciting topics, but you can make a contest out of anything.
So, keep reading for 5 simple and easy contest ideas to grow your business and drive revenue.
In today’s competitive world, growing your business and driving revenue is all about engaging prospects and inspiring them to take action. After all, what’s a business without customers?
Everyone loves to win things for free, so running contests with prizes is a great way to get prospects involved and excited about your brand’s offerings. The buzz created around a popular contest could also attract media attention, increasing the chance to gain more visibility.
Everyone who enters becomes a new potential customer. Techniques like gathering entries with an external form on your website or via email links let you collect data on new prospects for your CRM. As your contest numbers grow, so too should your business’s future prospects.
Let’s now take a look at 5 simple and easy contest ideas to grow your business and drive revenue.
Giveaways are perfect for creating hype and attracting attention. Once word spreads that you’re giving things away for free, expect to see prospects flock to your website.
If you’re thinking about running a giveaway, here are some different ideas:
Running time-sensitive giveaways creates a sense of urgency amongst your audience. If people feel they could miss out, they’re more likely to take part.
For example, post a question at 5 pm and give prizes to the first 20 people to answer correctly. To increase the drama, you could run live giveaways with a host over a video app or webinar platform. Live giveaways are great for fostering a sense of community.
And bonus, those who don’t win might now feel persuaded to make a purchase anyway.
Whether it’s once a month or once a week, holding regular giveaways keeps the buzz going and gives prospects a reason to return to your website again and again. A good tip is to ask entrants to sign up via email for a reminder, that’ll give you a load of email addresses for your CRM.
Remember to put names and faces to winners if possible. Show them off on your website and do short interviews if they’re up for it. It’ll inspire others to take part and prove that real people just like them can win.
Got a new product ready for launch? A giveaway could be the perfect way to spread the hype and get it out there. By giving shiny new things out for free, you’ll show yourself as a brand that cares about rewarding customers and having fun in the process.
It doesn’t matter what industry you’re in, product giveaways can work for anything. As long as you have a target audience, you have something to offer them. For example, if your target audience is tech-based, you could give them a cool new gadget, but if your target audience are sales teams, you could offer a more educational prize, like a new guide on how to create a proposal in Salesforce.
As long as it has value, you can give it away!
You can ask existing customers to refer a friend for the chance to win a prize in your next contest.
Referrals offer a great way to increase word of mouth and are easy to set up. Simply give existing customers a code or email link to forward on to friends and family. If new prospects end up purchasing, they can refer more people too.
Done right, referral campaigns have a snowball effect on your business. As they spread further around, they attract more volume and get bigger. The result is an increase in revenue and business growth.
If your business is on social media, you already have the perfect platform for hosting contests. If you’re not on social media, it’s time to change that!
Social media contests are useful for increasing engagement and getting people involved. Prizes can be given by getting users to engage with your profile and posts, whether it’s leaving a like, comment or subscribing.
You can get creative on social media to ensure your contest is visually appealing and enjoyable to take part in. There’s plenty to experiment with, from clickable videos to interactive posts.
One of the biggest benefits of ‘social media’ is in the name…it’s social. There’s enormous potential for your contests to attract the attention of friends lists and followers, especially when hashtags are utilised. You can also see what competitors are up to and try to better their efforts. For example, if you offer document automation software, you can show audiences why you’re the best competitor to Proposify.
Gamification is a growing trend for engaging customers and providing fun.
Giving out prizes through an exciting game format is a good way to incentivise customers to make purchases.
The Monopoly board game challenge from McDonald’s is a famous example of gamification.
Customers who purchase food items are given stickers to fill up their Monopoly board. Sometimes the stickers give instant wins like free food or shopping vouchers.
To please audiences in today’s digital world, game contests could also take place within an app or on social media.
Everyone loves a good story.
Chances are you have plenty of existing and prospective customers with great stories to tell. Turn this into a contest by asking them to share some words.
Useful prompts include:
To boost engagement, you could ask users to vote for their favorite/most convincing story.
If your industry is quite professional and niche, you may have to get creative with your story contests. For example, a business offering document automation software could ask, ‘Tell us how our Hubspot add-ons will help you.’ You’ll be surprised at how many people engage if there’s a prize up for grabs.
These five contest ideas will hopefully give you an easy way forward to grow your business and drive revenue. And, if you’re looking to make the whole process easier, consider a contest management software like Award Force to help streamline your contest.
From accepting, managing and judging entries to announcing and showcasing your winners, Award Force makes contest management a breeze.
Looking to offset the cost of a contest? You can maximise revenue with awards entry fees to get a bit back and offer better prizes.
Remember, contests are a great idea regardless of your industry. So no matter how ‘dull’ your niche is, a good contest should get everyone excited.
Yauhen Zaremba is the Director of Demand Generation at PandaDoc. He’s been a marketer for 10+ years, and for the last five years, he’s been entirely focused on how do you create an electronic signature, proposal, and document management markets. Yauhen has experience speaking at niche conferences where he enjoys sharing his expertise with other curious marketers. And in his spare time, he is an avid fisherman and takes nearly 20 fishing trips every year.
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