How To Use Contests to Generate Sales Leads

How To Use Contests to Generate Sales Leads - 315

Marketing is vital to all business. Large organizations have money and resources at their disposal. Small businesses and start-ups have to be creative to compete. How do you get your name in front of prospective customers and generate leads?

A fun way is to a run contest via social media. Incorporated correctly into your marketing plans these are a great way to spread the word about your company, provide a line of communication, and increase sales.

But how do you organize and run an online contest?

Here are some examples of how to use contests to generate sales leads:

  • Like and Share
    Ask fans to like and share your business page or a photo on the page. The winner is the person who shares it the most or gets the most likes, after sharing.Offer an incentive depending on what kind of business you have. It could be a discount on a product or service or a freebie. Make sure whatever they’re sharing, clearly shows your business or service. Be sure to include an end date and reveal the winner once the competition is over. A photo of the winner and their prize could be used as a spin off promotion of this contest.
  • Photo Contest
    Ask fans to take a photo of themselves with your product and post it to your page. Collect all the photos and put them in an album with the contest rules. The competitors won’t be able to resist sharing their photo and asking their friends to vote for them. The winner is the photo with the most likes.
  • Guess What?
    This is a fun way to interact with your fans and customers and can be tailored to your company. If you’re a local business you could take a picture, from a creative angle, of a building in your area and ask people what it is. Or take a very close up picture of one of your products making it difficult to know exactly what it is. The winner is chosen randomly from all the correct answers.
  • Be Creative
    This competition is a great way to get your name out and get some creative ideas for you. Example: A restaurant creates a new dish and asks people to come up with a name for it. The most likes would be the winner, and the winner would be the first person to try the new dish.Or for a company launching a new product line, ask fans to describe the product. The most original description would be the winner. There are many ways to make this type of contest work for your business.

There are apps available to run social media competitions. One of them is Tabsite. Tabsite is very user-friendly and allows you to create and manage apps and contests on your blog, website, and Facebook page. Tabsite offers easy set-up without coding or programming making it a good choice for most businesses.

Competitions are fun and can be customized for your business. They create a buzz and generate traffic to your social media and ultimately to your website where you can convert them into leads. Be sure to direct them to a landing page specific to the contest and include a ‘call to action’.

About Mike Gingerich

Mike Gingerich, President of Digital Hill & TabSite is a business blogger Marketer and Consultant. Part geek, part marketer, part strategist, total fitness and running junkie. Mike is an author and speaker, having presented at Social Media Week Lima, Social Media Camp (Canada) and more. Mike is a marketing, social media, and business startup enthusiast with 10+ years experience building apps, consulting, and training businesses with winning integrated strategies. Mike loves deploying tactics to increase awareness, sales, and maximize ROI in both B2B and B2C markets via digital media.