Tips on Marketing Your Own Site

Creating Effective Contest Promotions on your Website

Many websites have turned to contest promotions as a way of attracting more visitors. Versatility is one of the strengths of contest promotions as a marketing and promotional device for your site.

Contests are different from sweepstakes in that each individual entry is judged based on certain criteria. The winner is chosen based on those criteria and not randomly "drawn out of a hat." Sweepstakes, on the other hand, are random drawing raffle-type contests in which visitors enter their names and addresses into a form, and then the Webmaster collects all the entries. The webmaster then performs a random drawing to choose the winner. For purposes of this article, we consider contests and sweepstakes as being part of contest promotions.

So why do a lot of webmasters run contest promotions on their websites? And why should you consider doing the same? Here are some of the reasons:

• To Generate Publicity for your Website. These types of promotions are a great way to draw attention to your website. You can announce the results in the media, and winners are often quoted. This will translate into additional publicity for your website.

• To Produce a Spike in Traffic, Sign-ups or Sales. Naturally, people will have to visit your site to enter the promotion. The contest promotion then becomes a traffic-drawer. You can collect entrants' e-mail addresses and start-up a marketing database. When site visitors must make a purchase or sign-up for a service to enter the promo, then sign-ups and sales can be expected to shoot up.

• To Create Buzz around the Products offered on your Site. Draw consumer attention to your website and products offered therein by creating recognition, recall, awareness of features and benefits, and the impulse to buy.

• To Reward your Loyal Customers. Give your loyal customers a reason to stay loyal and involved on your site. A contest promotion gives them added incentive to continue patronizing your site.

• To Create A Sense of Community among Site Visitors/Customers. Certain contest promotions can be developed that would allow your site visitors and customers to compete with each other. This competition can create a certain sense of community that will translate into repeat visits from your customers.

There are many different ways you can set up a contest promotion on your website. Depending on how much time and effort you want to expend to maintain your promo, you can either set up a simple or a complex one.

A simple contest would entail having your entrants submit their entry according to certain criteria that you specify. For example, you could require that a photo or essay be submitted about a particular topic you choose. After all of the entries have been submitted, you would be responsible for judging which one you liked best (that met all of the entry requirements, of course), and announce them as the winner.

A complex contest would entail having more elaborate rules, and contestants could be required to visit the site more than once, just to finish the contest. Complex contests can take the form of a tournament, where they have to periodically update and/or modify their entries. They can also take the form of a popularity survey where entries can be posted on the website and visitors can be asked to vote for their preferred entries. These are but a couple of arrangements that can be put under the umbrella of complex contests, and the list is potentially long.

There are quite a number of options to choose from if you want a contest promotion on your website. These options give your visitors more fun and excitement than just entering their names and addresses into a form.

You might consider using some of the following:

• Instant-win Games. These games tend to create a lot of excitement. They are relatively simple, they are remembered more by consumers, and they have more "word-of-mouth" advertising punch. Scratch card promotions are the most common form of instant-win games.

  Adding an instant-win game to your site is not easy, though. If you have the programming resources in-house, you can create your own instant-win game. If you do not have in-house resources to create your own instant-win game, you might want to consider hiring a good Web development company to create one for you.

• Trivia Games. People enjoy answering challenging questions, and as such, trivia games on the Web are becoming increasingly popular.

  You can create your own trivia game if you have programming resources. If you do not have in-house resources to create your own trivia game, you might want to consider having a good Web development company host and maintain a trivia game for you, like eQuiz.

• Scavenger Hunts. If you want your site visitors to "wander" or "browse" through more pages of your website, you might want to consider setting up a scavenger hunt. You could have visitors search for a certain icon or graphic that you've hidden on one of your pages, and when the visitor clicks on it, a form pops up so they can enter their information into the drawing. You could change the location of the icon or graphic periodically, to deter visitors from bookmarking that page in an attempt to make it easy for future entries. You could also have them collect the page locations of more than one icon or graphic, and submit all locations into a single entry form accessible from your main page. There are many ways you can set up a scavenger hunt.

There are some critical issues that you must take into account when creating a contest. These are:

• Criteria. It is essential that criteria for determining winners be spelled out clearly for entrants. This is so that your contestants are given a fair and level playing field and this would also protect you from any player protests. It's also a good idea to structure criteria so that the same people don't win every time.

• Prizes. Offer something appropriate for your target audience and make it exciting. A console TV, for example, might be yawn-inducing, but a new flat-screen TV is something special.

• Legal issues. Consumer contests are subject to a host of regulations. For consumer contests, it is essential that you consult an attorney or promotion expert to ensure you are not unwittingly breaking the law. There are numerous arcane laws at both the state and federal level concerning contests and sweepstakes, and they change frequently. Get legal advice before proceeding. In general, published rules for consumer contests in the United States must include:

  - description of prizes
  - approximate value of prizes
  - odds of winning
  - where a list of winners may be obtained
  - duration of contest
  - restrictions, such as age or country of residence.

• Outside providers. How much time can you devote to creating, administering, promoting, and fulfilling your contest? If the answer is not much, it's wise to outsource. Another gauge of whether to look for outside help: what are the business risks of goofing up? If you put on a poorly-designed ontest for your five-person department, hopefully your colleagues will forgive you. But if you plan to invest a lot of money in prizes and promotion and you're targeting a crucial audience, the downside risks alone warrant hiring a consultant or a promotion agency.

• Budget. Major budget items for a contest include administrative costs, advertising and support materials, and prizes. Here are some tips about each area.

  - Administration. Don't forget travel expenses, fees for processing of entries; back-end activities, such as building a database of entrants; and costs associated with awarding the prizes, including notifying winners and staging an awards ceremony. If you decide to hire an outside agency, expect to pay a minimum of $5,000-$15,000 for program creation plus out-of-pocket expenses.

  - Advertising and support materials. Included here are the costs of creating and placing ads to publicize the contest. Publicity forums include newsletters, special mailings, and possibly teaser gifts to build momentum.

  - Prizes. Don't forget to include shipping costs, which can be formidable if you're awarding hundreds of second- and third-place prizes.

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