Contests
12 Reasons to Run a Holiday Promotion — 12 Days of Christmas Style
Thinking of how to sell in the idea of a holiday promotion to your client or manager? Here are 12 reasons why a holiday promotion would help achieve your 4th quarter marketing goals this year – with a little help from the 12 Days of Christmas. Build your brand: Your brand may be new — no followers, no customers, no sales. What better way to start off than to run a holiday sweepstakes for a chance to win something of value so your brand name will stand out amongst the holiday noise. Make your brand stand-out like a partridge … Continue reading
Cyber Monday Promotion Ideas to Bring Customers to Your Online Site
A Cyber Monday promotion could be the difference between someone choosing to shop at your online store or at your competition. Plan early for a Cyber Monday promotion specifically tailored to your brand and audience. If you sell online products and want to increase Cyber Monday sales overall: Run an online instant win game with chances to win high value prizes. An instant win game is a fun way to get people online and engaged in your brand. Your game could offer your own products or store credit as prizes. Run a social sweepstakes for the chance to win … Continue reading
6 Things NOT to Do When Planning a Holiday Promotion
Frequently we give out ideas or strategies for promotions, but sometimes we need to talk about the failures to prevent companies from making the same mistakes. Here is a quick list of what NOT to do when planning your holiday promotion so your brand can outshine the rest. Don’t forget who your customer is. One of my favorite “they did not just actually do that, did they?” moments was when a client decided to run an online sweepstakes but only promoted it to customers who were already in stores on Black Friday. The high number of entrants they were … Continue reading
Name Your Halloween Promotion! Use Our Super Scary Formula….
Use our creepy formula as inspiration for your next Halloween promotion for your brand. Your scary combination of words could be the next spine tingling brand success story! Use the first letter of your first name as your promotion descriptor: A = The Scary B = The Spooky C = The Creepy D = The Terrifying E = The Eerie F = The Spine Tingling G = The Bone Chilling H = The Foggy I = The Haunted J = The Horrifying K = The Bloody L = The Morbid M = The Deadly N = The Bizarre O = … Continue reading
Sweepstakes Rules Generator vs Custom Sweepstakes Rules
The allure of a sweepstakes rules generator is that you can create a set of sweepstakes rules for less money and less time. In fact, back in the day, Marden-Kane had an online sweepstakes rules generator of our own. Clients at that time could easily and cost-effectively create their own sweepstakes rules without legal fees or lengthy review times. The reality, however, was that most of our clients actually needed a custom solution. They would generate the rules and then realize that significant changes would need to be made. And while custom changes are always possible, if you don’t … Continue reading
6 Ways to Have a Sweepstakes Advantage
A sweepstakes is a promotion that involves an element of chance – usually a random drawing or random instant win. So are there ways to have a sweepstakes advantage if the drawing is random? Only if you make your entry count. Here’s how: Enter! Seems simple enough, but we have seen people start the entry form process and then never get to the submission success page. You can’t win if you don’t enter! Read and follow the official rules. If the rules say one entry per day, then don’t enter more than that. Similarly if you don’t live in the … Continue reading
What Promotion Incentives Work Best?
We are constantly asked by our clients what promotion incentives work best. Should they give away a lot of small things, or one big thing? What is the ideal value of an incentive or prize? Do small incentives work? Here is a short summary of what promotion incentives work to entice consumers to register for a promotion such as a sweepstakes or contest or loyalty program. But first, we need to understand who your brand’s customers are and identify the types of marketing that work with those customers. There are two types of marketing that work with … Continue reading
How to Run a Legal TikTok Contest or Sweepstakes
TikTok recently posted advertising guidelines for the US and EU, which don’t give a lot of guidance about contest guidelines, but that doesn’t mean that there are no rules to follow. To keep your TikTok Contest or Sweepstakes legal you should adhere to these seven basic recommendations for running a promotion on a social platform: Use a unique hashtag to track entries. The best way to track entries for a TikTok contest is by using a unique hashtag. Any post that is made during the posted timeframe of the promotion that has the pre-determined hashtag is considered an entry. … Continue reading
5 Reasons to Use Electronic Gift Codes as Prizes
Electronic gift codes, or e-gift codes, are a great option instead of traditional prizes or plastic gift cards in your next Sweepstakes or Contest. E-gift codes can be purchased from big retailers or restaurants and usually consist of a link with a redemption code and/or a confirmation code, or simply as a URL with the code embedded in the link. These e-gift codes can be redeemed online, and the codes and instructions can all be delivered via an email from your brand directly to your winners. Here’s why electronic gift codes make sense: 1. Lower Fulfillment Costs Electronic gift cards … Continue reading
How to Create Sweepstakes and Contests So Easy Anyone Can Enter
One of the biggest problems we see with online sweepstakes and contest concepts is that they can get overcomplicated or are run on platforms that the target audience is not using. When that happens, people get confused and do not enter — or worse, start bad-mouthing your brand. It’s time to start creating contests and sweepstakes so easy anyone can enter. As we like to say, don’t set the bar too high for entry or entrants will drop off. Here are four things to remember when planning your next sweepstakes or contest: Keep it simple. Limit yourself to no more … Continue reading
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