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A sweepstakes platform is an essential tool for sweepstakes marketing that brands need to have in place.
Effective sweepstakes marketing helps brands maximize their ROI from their promotions.
Why?
The positive benefits of sweepstakes marketing become evident as your promotion helps to increase brand awareness, attract leads and sales, and increase engagement.
Here are the benefits of having a sweepstakes marketing strategy and how to create one.
Article Contents
IN THIS ARTICLE:
- Why are sweepstakes effective?
- What is sweepstakes marketing?
- Why and when to hire a sweepstakes company
What Is Sweepstakes Marketing?
Sweepstakes marketing communicates why participants should choose your sweepstakes, including the benefits of your promotion, the prizes, and the requirements for participants as set forth in the official rules.
Sweepstakes marketing can include any number of methods such as paid search ads, social media marketing, influencer marketing, and email marketing in order to attract participants to enter.
Sweepstakes Marketing Is Used by Top Brands
The vast majority of Fortune 500 companies are using sweepstakes marketing. In fact, it’s also used by small businesses, solopreneurs, and book authors.
Why? Because it’s effective.
Sweepstakes Marketing Is Impossible Without Sweepstakes Management
Regardless of which tactics you deploy in your sweepstakes marketing, ideally it should be done in combination with professional sweepstakes management, also called sweepstakes administration.
Here is a quick overview of what is involved in sweepstakes administration:
- Designing your promotion
- Choosing sweepstakes prizes
- Drafting official rules
- Launching your promotion
- Winner notification
- Prize procurement and fulfillment
- Legal compliance
To be effective at sweepstakes marketing, you have to have the time and resources to do it, in addition to, administering the sweepstakes promotion. It’s also essential to have a documented sweepstakes marketing strategy which an agency will create for you.
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How Sweepstakes Marketing Works
Your brand can use sweepstakes marketing to attract participants. It’s also used to make the case for customers to buy your product or search for your brand when they are researching what they want to buy.
For the greatest possible return on your promotion, you need to deliver the right sweepstakes marketing content at each stage of your promotion: from the launch through following up after your sweepstakes has ended.
This is why we recommend doing sweepstakes marketing via a marketing agency and alongside a sweepstakes platform so that you get the help and app tools that you need. This will actually simplify the process.
Here’s how sweepstakes marketing works at each stage of a sweepstakes promotion to maximize ROI.
Sweepstakes Campaign Awareness Stage
Weeks or months before your sweepstakes goes live, your sweepstakes marketing content should focus on building excitement for your upcoming promotions.
Make sure that your marketing speaks to your customers’ paint points and answers questions about your brand to attract participants who will become customers.
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Your content at this stage should be educational while expressing a sense of urgency given that sweepstakes and contests are time-sensitive promotions.
Don’t try to sell at this stage as you can do that later during and after the promotion.
Sweepstakes Launch Stage
Once your sweepstakes launches, you will only have a limited amount of time to maximize participation before the promotion ends.
At the sweepstakes launch stage, your content should be more aggressive and make use of CTAs that encourage participants to sign up.
To promote your brand, products, and/or services, you should be sending out coupons, discounts, and other offers. These offers are designed to get participants to check out your website and products or services during the promotion.
This is how you use sweepstakes marketing to generate instant sales during a sweepstakes.
Sweepstakes Marketing at the Closing Stage and Beyond
Unlike other types of marketing, sweepstakes marketing doesn’t end when a customer makes a purchase.
Instead, after a sweepstakes promotion ends, your sweepstakes marketing should take the form of nurturing campaigns that help keep your brand in customers’ minds, even when they aren’t buying.
Your central message should be all of the benefits of your brand and why remaining loyal is in their best interest.
You can focus on making sales but do so now by thoroughly educating customers with drip campaigns.
Another aspect of sweepstakes marketing during this stage is to make sure that you keep participants in the loop.
This will ensure that you have a ready pool of participants to tap into the next time you want to run another sweepstakes for your brand.
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How to Get Started With Sweepstakes Marketing
Sweepstakes marketing is best done by a sweepstakes marketing company.
Sweepstakes marketing is most effective when it reaches your audience via a variety of touchpoints and not just social media.
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The #1 Secret of Sweepstakes Marketing
Be unique. That’s the secret but it’s not really a secret at all if you are using sweepstakes marketing to establish a competitive advantage.
When you choose a sweepstakes marketing company to work with, you should approach the company that has the resources you need to create the type of promotion that you want.
The best evidence that a sweepstakes marketing company is the right fit for your brand is that they are able to create a sweepstakes marketing plan for your business that spans more than one sweepstakes promotion.
They also need to be able to reach the influencers of your industry giving you the opportunity to run sweepstakes that go viral.
How to Hire a Sweepstakes Marketing Agency
To start your search for a sweepstakes marketing agency, review the websites and social media accounts of various agencies to determine if they offer the types of services that you are looking for.
Make sure to read testimonials, case studies, and reviews of the company on multiple platforms to see if the agency has promoted successful sweepstakes in the past.
Ideally, you want:
A sweepstakes marketing company with expertise in your industry. For example, if you are a CPG brand who needs sweepstakes marketing, you need a provider who has a deep understanding of sweepstakes advertising laws so that you can promote your sweepstakes in retail locations.
A good track record with their current and previous clients. Does the company make sure to openly display their sweepstakes marketing case studies and client testimonials on their website? Are these promotions aligned with our own marketing goals?
Flexibility in their sweepstakes marketing services. Can you choose only the marketing services that you are not already doing in-house or via a sweepstakes platform?
Free consultation. If you’re not sure whether you want to run a sweepstakes or contest yet, can you meet with the agency in order to get your pre-hiring questions answered?
Point of contact. Will the sweepstakes marketing company assign you an account manager? What will be your primary points of contact (text, emails, phone calls)? Will you have access to the account manager during critical times, such as the start date of the promotion?
Looking for a sweepstakes marketing company to help you with your next promotion? Sweepsify helps you find top sweepstakes companies in seconds. Create your free Premium account now to get started.
