Running a competition on Facebook is a great way to grow your fanbase and engage with existing and potential customers. It also gives fans a solid reason to “like” your page. A photo contest is a great way to get your page filled with fun shareable content, whilst making your fans feel involved with your brand.
When running a photo contest, ensure it relates to your brand somehow. For example if you’re a retail company selling outdoor clothing, ask your fans to upload a picture of themselves wearing an item whilst enjoying the great outdoors. Make sure it’s easy for your audience to produce as this will increase your chances for participation.
Figure out what the prize is going to be as this is the biggest call to action in terms of participation. Assess what you can afford and think about what people can get excited about. You could offer a free product, a major discount or a gift voucher. Gift vouchers or money off are effective as a large number of people only follow a brand to see what freebies or discounts they can get.
Competition Promotion
It may potentially be worth running a Facebook ad campaign or promoting your post to alert people of the competition. Is the competition worthy of viral sharing? Just having a major giveaway isn’t enough to have viral success, you have to work at building up hype and excitement.
Rules and Regulations
There are plenty of rules for running Facebook competitions. You’re unable to run a competition just from your wall, as potentially you can get your page shut down, as it can look spammy. For example, you can’t just ask someone to post a photo or like a status to be eligible to win.
In order to run a photo contest on Facebook, you will have to have a Facebook competition application. One of the easiest apps to use is Shortstack. Shortstack has some ready made templates for you to use for your competition. There are some which make someone “like” your page before they can upload a photo and others which allow a fan to upload stories. Shortstack is free if you have under 2,000 likes and after that prices start from $15 a month to set up.
The Winner
Once you’ve had your entries and you have a winner, make a feature of this on Facebook. Use the image as part of your announcement. You could potentially run other competitions which allow fans to upload a photo and the winner’s photo could then be on the background for a week. This helps people to feel valued and will forge a relationship with the brand if they feel involved .
If you’d like some inspiration on how to use Facebook for your social media campaigns – check out my blog on Facebook’s Marketing Resources. Miromedia’s SEO Birmingham agency can help to develop your brand through using social media marketing. Contact us today to speak to one of our friendly team.
