Everyone loves free stuff. That is why you will find a ton of Facebook contests and sweepstakes offering you free stuff. There are even websites devoted to helping you find free stuff via Facebook promotions. So why aren’t you entering every single Facebook promotion you see?
Brands use promotions to gain new fans, get more engagement, add to lead lists – the objective list goes on and on. Seasonal promotions like Groundhog Day are now second nature to CPG brands. So while offering free stuff is awesome, Facebook users can smell a disingenuous promotion from a mile away, or at least before they ever choose to enter your promotion.
To better understand how to engage your target audience with your Facebook promotions, we have a few examples of great ones:
Ergobaby’s Carrier-a-Day Giveaway
Ergobaby used a referral campaign to get its current fans to refer their friends to the brand. Fans were entered to win a a baby carrier every day for a month. Those who successfully referred two or more friends were eligible to win a $500 gift card as well. The brand added 15,000 fans on Facebook and gained nearly 15,000 referrals.
For a baby product brand like Ergobaby, the target audience may react better to referrals and word-of-mouth than they would a normal promotion. If you are working on a brand newsletter and want to gain more leads, or receive more referrals from your current fans, you should definitely consider just asking them in your promotion.
Marshalls #FabFound
Bargain fashion retailer Marshalls is currently running a weekly contest for its fans to share their fabulous Marshalls finds. Fans upload their images to Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter with the hashtag #fabfound. The fan with the most votes at the end of the week wins a $50 gift card to Marshalls – simple enough.
Why does this work? People love selfies, and finding deals. By making the entry barrier fairly simple and targeting the right users, Marshalls engages the right crowd who will provide a great amount of user-generated content to win. Also by using a voting component, Marshalls receives additional awareness through participants who spread the word to get more votes.
GrubHub’s Slab Happy Sweeps
Food delivery app GrubHub thrives on fun promotions to get its fans engaged online. They often offer free grub for interesting photo captions from fans, feature GrubHubrs of the Week, and other fun stuff through various promotions. One of these is Slab Happy: A Bacon Sweeps.
Bacon is hot right now: it’s on donuts, in chocolate, and definitely on the minds of many in GrubHub’s target demographic. So why not have a bacon-themed sweepstakes?
In addition to bacon-scented soap, bacon-flavored floss, and other odd bacon-themed items, participants could also receive $5 vouchers to use on GrubHub. While the prizes may seem small, the entry barrier is almost too easy to pass up, even if you don’t like bacon. All users needed was to fill out a simple form and winners were instantly chosen, making everything short and simple.
Overall takeaways from our examples include not just including prizes that your audience will want, but making the entry process as easy as possible to get the participation you want. What are some other great Facebook promotions that you have seen? Let us know in the comments below.
