How to Run a Promotional Giveaway Campaign

Giveaway campaigns can increase your customer base by an average of 34% and make your social media grow 70% faster. It works similar to advertising but is more effective because you give the customers something tangible and of value to remember your brand by.

You can run giveaway campaigns at events, trade shows, or online platforms. This article discusses the steps for running online promotional giveaway campaigns to promote and grow your business.

The impact of giveaway campaigns

The aim of most giveaways is to bolster your brand’s footprint. The more people see your logo on custom promo caps, t-shirts, or other products, the more they become familiar with your brand, and the likelier they are to choose you.

Executed correctly, a giveaway campaign can also help you -

• Generate organic inquiries
  
• Improve Product Exposure
  

• Increase Your Social Media Followers

• Encourage customers interactions

• Expand your customer base

So how do you run a promotional giveaway campaign?

While people love free gifts, simply throwing products their way is not enough. Promotional giveaways should combine different strategies, such as engaging with customers and selecting the right products to represent your brand, and should include your long-term goals.

Follow the steps described below to make sure you are on track for success.

1. Define your goals

Kicking off your giveaway campaign with well-defined goals is the most reliable way to get results. Here are some goals that companies set when they run a campaign -

• Boost brand reach or product awareness

• Get more subscribers or social media followers

• Drive more website traffic

• Generate sales

• Increase user engagement

It is the goal that shapes your campaign and helps you find the right action-gating. Action-gating is when you ask the users to perform an action (like posting a picture, sharing your post, tagging a friend in the comments, and so on) to enter the campaign. Ideally, the ‘action’ should align with your marketing goals.

For example, If your goal is to increase user engagement - the action should be to submit a photo. If you want to grow your mailing list - get them to sign up. For more word of mouth, encourage people to share their stories and so on ;

2. Center your campaign around a theme.

Giveaway campaigns work best when they are set in a context or theme. The easiest way is to piggyback on popular events, like how many companies center their giveaways around Christmas orNew Year, seasons, or a national holiday. You can also get creative and tap into trending topics. Building your campaign around a popular event allows you to use appropriate hashtags and gives you a higher likelihood of reaching more people

3. Set the rules

Whether it is a sweepstake or a contest, you need to establish clear and unambiguous rules. Describe them in detail to avoid misunderstandings. Explicitly stating the rules also convinces your audience about the authenticity of the giveaway and the chance of winning, further encouraging them to participate.;

The rule set should include the following details -

Eligibility - Who is eligible? What should they do to enter? Are there age or location limits?

Date and time - When should people start entering? When is the deadline? Write everything down to the exact hours and timezone to avoid any ambiguity.

Picking the winner - If you are running a contest, explain how you will choose the winner. It could be as simple as who gets the most likes for their photo submission. For sweepstakes, come up with a fun and fair way to choose a random winner.

Include a mini version of the rules in your giveaway posts with a link to the full rules. If you have any doubts, consult a legal expert regarding your campaign rules to ensure everything is done within correct legal bounds.

4. Choose the right products

5. Choose the right platformss

6. Build the hype to promote Your Giveaway

Facebook posts, Instagram stories, Tweets, Email newsletters, blog posts, website popups - use everything at your disposal to spread the word about the giveaway even before it is launched. You can also partner with popular content creators to bring your giveaway to the forefront.

Aim for lasting hype, so that the giveaway not only brings you more user interaction but also strengthens your brand’s image. The best part? The positive hype around your company will motivate people to share it with their friends online and offline

7. Track Your Results

The contest is over, you found a winner and shared the news with the rest of the world. Did the effort and energy you spend bring you the expected results? You will never know unless you analyze the results. In fact, forgetting to analyze the results is one of the biggest mistakes you can make while running a giveaway.

Some of the Key Performance Indicators you can track are-

• Engagement Rate - the ratio of total participation(likes/comments/registrations) to your total audience size

• Increase in social media follower count

• Increase in organic website traffic

• Conversion rate - the ratio of total purchases to total visitors

• User demographics

• Increase in Search Volume for your Brand/Product

• Revenue generated/Increase post-campaign launch

See how far you have come to achieving your goals all the way from step one. Note down what went right and wrong. Integrate these insights to run a giveaway that’s even more successful the next time.

Now that you know what to do, it’s time to start planning your successful online giveaway! If you are wondering what to give away, consider customized hats from CapBargain. Caps are popular, stylish, and useful to your customers. They come in a variety of styles like baseball hats, dad hats, trucker hats, beanies, flat visors, fitted hats, snapbacks, and can be easily decorated with your brand name, logo, or slogan.  

Here at CapBargain, you can easily start designing your promo cap for free! Our Custom Design Creator lets you add texts, images, and designs to any cap with just a few clicks. If you like your design, just hit the ‘Request a Quote’ button and we will get your caps ready in no time.