It's never a bad idea to host a contest on your business's Facebook page.  Not only does it help drive new people to your business page, it also helps increase traffic.  Even if people don't end up winning the contest, many of them remain interested in your business and buy products or services.  Before you start your own competition, however, you need to know the rules of the road: what you can and can't do, what will work best, and what will impress present and potential customers.

Procedures

Facebook has policies about what you can and cannot do when it comes to hosting contests.  It's always a good idea to know about these rules, and stay up to date on them.  Since Facebook can change these rules at any time, make sure to check them each time before hosting a new contest.  Facebook's first rule is that if you create a contest for your business, you are responsible for upholding and regulating that contest.  That includes writing and following official rules, having and following terms and requirements, and following all rules governing the promotion of the prize(s) offered.  For example, say you have a restriction on your contest that no one under the age of 18 can enter.  You are then responsible for upholding this rule.  Facebook then has another set of rules.  All promotions, such as a contest, on Facebook, must include a complete release of Facebook by each entrant, and an acknowledgement that the promotion isn't sponsored by, or promoted by, Facebook.  You can also not use Personal Timelines to administer promotions.  As stated earlier, these rules can always change, so it's important that you check up on them before you start your own business contest.

Contest Ideas

Once you get the logistics out of the way, it's important to put together a fun, creative contest that will attract lots of people.  Make sure that the contest is something worth entering for.  If people feel that they have to put a lot of effort into the contest for little reward, they won't participate.  Make signing up easy to do.  Have a simple form that the contestant can fill out, or a small task they have to do, such as "like" or "share" your page.  This way entering the contest is fairly easy and un-complicated.  You should also know what type of comptetition you're going to host.  One type of contest you could have is a sweepstakes, which is the typical, everyone enters and one name is randomly pulled from a hat.  Another idea is a caption contest: choose a funny photo and ask people to write a caption for it.  This way, entering is still easy, and you can pick the one you like the best, or have people vote for their own favorite.  Other ideas are photo competitions or story competitions.  These take a little more effort, where the contestant has to submit some type of original work, like a photograph or a story.  Again, you can choose whichever you like best, or have people vote for their favorites.  Chooseing a prize is also a big factor in the contest, and not one that should be taken lightly.  You can get something small, like a book or chocolates.  Most businesses use something that's related to their business.  For example, say you are a golf-club crafter.  Your prize may be one of your own crafted gold clubs.  Another idea is to give away something that would appeal to your target market.  For example, if you target market is teenagers, maybe give away a cheaper tablet, or an iPod.  If your target is women, maybe give away a basket of fragrances and lotions.  A great example of well done Facebook contests is Bakery Square.  They frequently host contests that have a high turnout.

Benefits

You may be asking yourself why you should go to the trouble of hosting a contest.  In fact, there are quite a few benefits to hosting your own business contest.  First of all, you're going to attract many more people from your target audience to your business page.  Not all people want to spend money on products, but many will sign up to win something for free!  With a contest, the likes and shares you get are going to most likely be real accounts, instead of fake or spam accounts.  With the people who enter your contest you can gather information about the type of people interested in your business.  If you ask for email addresses from contestants, you can use that information to market to entrants on other types of platforms.

For more information on marketing your business Facebook page, contact a Blue Archer professional.

Michelle Hawley

Digital Content Writer

@BlueArcherPGH