So, you want to have a giveaway on Instagram? You’ve probably hit a follower milestone or a holiday is coming up and there is no better way to celebrate then to give back to your audience!
Not only are giveaways a great way to create some buzz, but it is also one of the fastest ways to increase your following. There are some general guidelines that I like to stick to when hosting a contest. Do not worry, I will also cover some of the “don’ts” to help ensure your next giveaway is a huge success!
1. The planning phase
Good news! You have decided to host a contest. That is the first step and probably the hardest part. Now you have to figure out all of the details.
Hosts
How many hosts do you want to have? Do you even want to have any hosts or make it a solo giveaway? If you choose to have additional hosts, it is best practice to keep the number of hosts’ low. I like to keep my host count between 4-6, this number would include myself.
When asking people to join your contest, be sure to have all of your details ironed out. Having all of your details will show people you have some idea of what you are doing and will feel more confident in your leadership ability. You should not require your hosts to do anything more than to post the giveaway. Requesting hosts to gather prizes can be off-putting as the contest is not technically their undertaking.
Prizes
There are two categories of prizes for giveaway.
Category 1
This is the most traditional way that contests have prizes. The prizes are “donated” to your giveaway by a company that you ask. It is ideal that you already have a good working relationship with the companies you are contacting. However, this is not required.
Category 2
Host funded prizes. This is not the most ideal way to have prizes for some people. Why? Because it costs the hosts money. There is a “buy-in” to be a part of the contest. The cost can range wildly depending on the prize, usually, it is for a high-ticket item such as a camera.
The rules
Once you have your hosts and vendors figured out, you’ll need to determine what your rules will be. Here are the questions you need to ask yourself:
Will it be a domestic or international contest? If it is international, you’ll need to double-check with your vendors that they can still participate.
What kind of contest will it be?
Tag and win, where entrants are required to tag accounts in the comments with a random winner.
Photo contest, the entrants are required to post a new photo and use your contest unique hashtag and a winner will be based on the post meeting the caption and photo theme criteria
What will the contest time frame be? Be sure to include a time with the time zone.
How many winners will there be? Will there be a winner takes all or will there be prize packages with multiple winners?
If there are multiple prize packages, will you require the entrants to follow only the vendors for the prizes they want or all of the vendors regardless?
Do you want extra credit entries with story shares or make story shares a requirement? Keeping track of these can be very cumbersome. I recommend requiring story shares and then double-checking your messages when a winner is chosen.
2. Writing your contest caption template
Here is a template or guide for you when writing your contest caption.
✨GIVEAWAY✨
[A very brief intro as to why you’re having a contest]
Rules
Follow all hosts listed below:
@host
@host
@host
Follow the vendors listed below (break into packages if necessary)
@vendor- list prize item
@vendor- list prize item
@vendor- list prize item
How to enter:
If tag and win: Tag accounts in the comments (1 comment per entry unlimited entries, 3 accounts per comment 1 entry per person, etc)
If photo contest: Post a new photo with the hashtag #ContestHashtag that meets the contest theme list the theme.
Fine print
The contest is (indicate It is international or domestic). Winner’s must follow all hosts and vendors to be considered eligible to win. Contest ends on [list date and time with time zone]. Must be [age] years old to enter. The contest is not affiliated with Instagram.
Make sure your caption is easy to read and gets right to the point. Too many accounts to follow and you’ll have a hard time getting entries. If your prize is not interesting enough, you may not have much success either. Most importantly, very that you have spelled and verified all of your host and vendors’ account names.
3. Contest flyer
This will be the face of your giveaway. It is best to select a photo with a lot of negative space so that you can write “giveaway” on it with a free font app like Font Candy or Phonto.
To show a visual of the prizes you may want to make the post a carousel with the additional photos being that of the prizes.
4. Posting your contest on Instagram
It is finally the day, to set your contest live! Discuss with your hosts on a time frame that works best for everyone and post when it is ideal for the majority of hosts. It is ok to post and not have all hosts share the giveaway at the same time.
5. Selecting a winner
When your contest is over, selecting a winner in a fair and honest manner is critical. If your audience has any reason to believe that your contest is rigged, your credibility for future contests is shot.
To select a winner for tag and win contests, these should be completely random. Find an online random comment picker to select your winner. If there are multiple hosts, what I do is have a random name pulled from each contest flyer, and then from that list of finalists put them in another random online name picker and whoever is selected by that site is the winner.
To select a winner for photo contests, I recommend for my cohosts to select their top 5 photos and give a tally mark for each photo that is recommended. In the end, the photo with the most tally marks is deemed the winner. Sometimes you will find accounts who have entered multiple photos and they may be recommended multiple times with different photos. I’m this case discuss amongst your hosts if you will be selecting a winner based on how many times a photo was recommended or how many times an account was recommended.
To select a winner for contests in which money was contributed, I recommend that hosts have some say in who wins. If it is a tag and win contest, I have finalists from each host flyer randomly selected, and then from the finalist’s list, all of the hosts discuss who they feel should win the prize.
These are purely recommendations; you can always select a winner however you please.
6. Confirming your winner has followed all of the rules
Rules are rules. To make sure your winner has followed all of the rules you will need to go through their follower’s list and type in all of the accounts that they were required to follow. If you find that even just one account was not followed your tentative winner is no longer eligible to win. I have had instances where people I am close or familiar with not win a contest because not all of the rules were followed. It’s not personal, it’s business.
7. Announcing your winner
Announcing your winner is easy. Post your winner to your stories and tag all of your cohosts so that they can share the good news! Archive your contest flyer so your feed continues to go uncluttered.
I wish you the best of luck and all of the success in your next Instagram contest! If you like any of this information helpful please spread the word on Instagram and tag me @jaxandthepack.