11 Small Business Social Promotion Ideas for the Shutdown
Small businesses, especially those considered non-essential right now, have to come up with creative ideas to retain loyal customers and ensure that they will have a business to reopen. For most small business this is definitely not “business as usual,” but rather, “business unusual” that keeps you in the black. For each of these small business social promotion ideas, please remember that each social platform has promotion guidelines that still apply and the FTC is still watching to make sure you are running your hashtag promotions legally. For Retail: Make your customers into your brand ambassadors during these challenging … Continue reading
5 Ways a Sweepstakes Can Help Your New Business Marketing Goals
We get it. Running a new business probably takes up all of your time, and you don’t have a lot of extra energy to think about marketing your business. Running a simple sweepstakes, however, could be the way to meet your new business marketing goals. By running a 30 day simple sweepstakes with a high value prize you could achieve one of the following five new business marketing goals: Get new followers on social. Facebook, Instagram, Instagram Stories, YouTube, Twitter, TikTok and SnapChat are all platforms where you can run a sweepstakes, as long as you follow the promotion … Continue reading
Can You Run an Instagram Stories Sweepstakes?
Clients have been asking us lately if they can run an Instagram Stories sweepstakes or contest. Here are the facts. What are Instagram Stories? Instagram Stories are a feature of Instagram that allows users to post short videos or photos of their day in a sort of “highlight reel” that disappears in 24 hours. Similar to Snapchat, you can add text or animation or effects to your posts, as well as decide if they are public or available to only your followers. You can also add your favorite Instagram Stories to your profile as “Highlights.” In layman’s terms, here … Continue reading
The Most Visited Promotional Marketing Posts You Should Consult in 2020
These were the most visited promotional marketing posts by Marden-Kane from 2019. There were quite a few trending topics — like TikTok Contests, tying the Tokyo Olympics into your promotion, content moderation basics, and more! You might want to revisit them for your 2020 promotional marketing planning! 1. How to Run a Legal TikTok Contest or Sweepstakes TikTok does not currently have any posted contest guidelines, but that doesn’t mean that there are no rules. To keep your TikTok Contest or Sweepstakes legal you should adhere to these seven basic recommendations for running a promotion on a social platform. Continue … Continue reading
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
Facebook Custom Application Changes for Brands
Recently, Facebook made an API change to brand pages that prevents a new custom application (also called a custom tab) from being added to a brand page if that brand page has less than 2,000 followers. This means that if you are starting a new Facebook page for your brand or business, or if you a small brand, and you want to add a custom application (i.e. a sweepstakes form on your Facebook page), you won’t be able to do it until you get at least 2,000 followers. While this doesn’t hurt large, established brands, it does impact smaller brands … Continue reading
Avoid Clickbait Tactics to Make Your Social Sweepstakes a Success
Take a look at your social feed right now. Look on any platform — Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Youtube, Snapchat — and start scrolling. How long does it take for you to find a post or story or tweet running a “giveaway?” The “giveaway” is everywhere on social. Mommy bloggers, Instagram dogs, major brands, and influencers are all running giveaways. And while the chance to win some swag might be appealing to some, the giveaway sponsors need to avoid clickbait tactics as social platforms have had so many bad actors and fake giveaways that a legal social sweepstakes could get … Continue reading
Content Moderation: A Requirement for Social Posts and Contests
Content moderation has made the headlines lately as social channels like Facebook and Twitter tried to deal with “fake news” stories and inappropriate content. There is a torrent of video and written content being produced and distributed through the various social platforms, and content moderators work around the clock, deciding what needs to be taken down and what can remain. But what about content moderation for your brand’s social channels, or for your sweepstakes and contests? The overwhelming volume of social interaction on most brand social channels may have us believe it is impossible to keep watch over it … Continue reading
5 Ways to Improve How You Run a Giveaway on Social Channels
Do you want to know how to run a giveaway on social channels, but are looking for how to do it legally and using best practices? Here are 5 things to consider when you run a giveaway. 1. Include rules. While a good many “giveaways” on social do not seem to have a legal set of rules, that doesn’t mean you don’t need them! Official rules are what protect you in court should anything go wrong and you need to defend yourself. A good set of rules will outline who can enter, how to enter, what the prizes will … Continue reading
Paying for Votes Doesn’t Pay Off
If you are lucky enough to be a finalist in a contest you might think about going to extraordinary lengths to win — like paying for votes. But what really works and what is a bad idea? Before you get yourself into trouble and get disqualified, you should consult the official rules of the contest. The rules outline all the ways you could get disqualified for cheating, and some things that you think are harmless could end up hurting your chances. Here is a partial list of some things that you should never do, or at least do thorough … Continue reading
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