How to plan an Instagram contest to be as effective as possible? step by step guide

Is social network has become one of the platforms that has grown the most in recent years, where more and more users join this community, either for create a personal or business account. Bearing in mind that this social network is used by a large number of companies and brands with the aim of achieving more sales.

One of the most feasible alternatives for most companies is to hold contests, because through them they can achieve a growth of up to 70% of followers compared to those accounts that do not. In this way your products and services can be known by a larger audience.

Nevertheless, an Instagram contest is not so simplefor this it is necessary that you have in account some aspects that allow you to plan such action successfully. That is why we are going to show you below how to carry out these contests effectively and thus make your brand known by many more users.

What should we keep in mind when planning an Instagram contest?

As already mentioned above, creating a contest on said platform is not so easy and so simple, since for it to be successful it must have several fundamental aspects. Keep in mind that it is of no use to you create a contest when you don’t have enough followers or you don’t know what public is directed.

That is why here we are going to show you what aspects you should take into account when planning these projects in your social network:

Current number of followers

One of the most important things to keep in mind is the number of followers your business or personal account has, to create contests it is recommended that it have as minimum 1000 followerssince this will allow it to reach a sufficient number of people for it to be successful.

You must consider that the objective of these projects is increase the number of followers and therefore make your products or services reach a larger audience. This means that if you have 800, 500 followers or lessit may not be very profitable to do this type of activity, since it will surely you will not achieve the expected results and simply you will end up losing prize money.

Interests of your audience

If you already have an established profile and the number of followers required to carry out this type of activity, So the next thing to keep in mind is the interest of your audience. Namely, if your profile is about selling sportswear, You should keep in mind that most of your followers they are persons interested in sporting goodsso you will have to draw some sports garment.

To do this, focus on number of female and male audience follows youthis will let you know what kind of garment or object you can offeryou can also offer as a prize items that are for both a woman and a man Or simply offers two prizes and two winners. It is very important that you keep in mind the interest of your audience as their gender.

prize value

The value of the prize is another fundamental aspect to consider all the time, for this you must know what type of audience your contest is targetingthat is, if only It is available to people who live in your same city or to the general public. If you are going to carry out this type of activity for all the public in generalthen the most recommendable thing is that the prize is based on money, either in dollars or euros.

You can offer a prize for a value of €100, €200, €300 or simply offer three places. Please note that when offered money involved the interest of people is much higherso you can get many more members of the social network to want to participate in your contest.

The draw time

At the time of raising this type of activities It is essential that you are very clear about the time in which the winner will be chosenwhether it is done in 15 days or one month. In this kind of case the most recommended is that the draw time does not exceed 30 daysbut to be carried out in a time span from 15 to 20 days.

Specify how the winner will be chosen

One of the reasons why many users do not decide to participate in this type of activities created on the platform It is because they do not know how the winner will be chosen or how much transparency there is in it. For this it is essential that you say that programs you will use to select the winner or if you will do it through a direct.

Therefore, you must decide if you will do it through a application or a notaryall these details will allow you achieve greater credibility with the participants and that way you will get them to be more people who want to participate in it. It is also very good that you indicate why methods you will make the payment, in case it is money.

Is it convenient to pay to promote the contest if I have few followers?

Promote your trading account It will always be a very good option, especially if what you want is get more followers and thus make yourself known to increase your sales. However, you must be clear that you must do this type of promotion with other accounts that are in your same sector.

If what you want is sell some product such as food at homethen if you are going to look for who I promoted your contest make sure that the account that does it is from your same area and that it has enough followers how so you can profit from said action and the money you have invested in it. Taking into account that Instagram promotions currently They are usually a bit pricey.

Learn step by step how to plan an Instagram contest and get the most out of it

Knowing everything mentioned above, the only thing left to explain is how you can start planning these contests in the right way and thus get the most out of it.

To do this, you will need to follow each of the steps that we are going to explain below:

Be clear about your ultimate goals

If you want to make a contest through social network it’s because you already have some goals in mind and if you don’t have them, then you need to create them. For this these goals must be tangiblethey will depend on the type of contest you are organizing. if you settle down the final goalsby the time you finish this project you will know what how successful the activity was or was not.

This means that if you do this project with the purpose of increase your followers and that way give your posts more visibilitythen at the end of the projectyour followers must have increased by at least 70%, and hence your publications must have a higher number of visits.

Choose what type of contest you want to carry out

Actually in instagram social network a great variety of contests are handled, these depend mainly on the person who has created it. That’s how you can create projects just trying to like to winin this case the objective is that Users who like certain posts are eligible.

Another way to do all of this is for people to leave a comment to participate, for this the account that provides the specific contest that publications must comment in order to be participating for the final prize. Even many of these activities consist of like and comment on some posts.

You can also ask users to return to publish your content selected for the contest and that have it on their profile for a period of time prespecified. This method is considered one of the most effective to publicize your brand.

Another way to carry out this type of activity is that each person who wants to participate in it must tag at least 5 more friends, in this way you will be achieving that many other people can get to your post easily. Or finally you can ask your participants who publish one of your uploaded photos and use a specific hashtag where they mention your brand and in this way they will begin to participate for the final prize.

Select a major award

As mentioned earlier in the post, the reward is one of the most important factors in this type of activities. Therefore, you must choose a prize that is related to your business or in that case offer a Amount of money that is tempting enough for you the other members of the platform decide to participate.

In case you want to offer some physical awardyou must keep in mind how it will be done the delivery for those people who do not live in your same city and that in turn it is a prize that makes your contestants thrill.

Know the rules of Instagram

if you’re thinking about create a contest on the social network You must bear in mind that like any other platform, it has some rules specifically which you must comply with. Therefore, it is important that you read the document and the risks that they can be associated with these types of activities..

Set the contest rules

Once you are clear about the rules you set Instagram, you should set your own rules for the contestin this case you must establish certain rules that must meet the participants so that they can contestyou can publish these through a website or through a blog.

It is also important that set the contest datesHow are you going to do it? the start date and the end date. In addition, you must specify how announce the winner, and in turn The minimum age of the participants to compete. In the case that the winner is under 18 years oldyou may announce the winner without indicating the full name of the person.

Choose the correct hashtag

One way to make it your publications reach a greater number of people is by using hashtags, for this you must make sure use the correct labels. At this point you should choose the most appropriate keywords for your product, must be clear and effectiveas well as easy to remember.

Promote your contest

This is a key factor for the success of your contesttherefore, you must decide what how do you want to promote itwhether you do it before startup or during development time. You must keep in mind the theme that will accompany your campaignit should be able to capture the public’s attention.

You must also use channels to promote them, in this case you can make use of all your social networks. Take into account the time, in this case the dates of the promotions, as well as the dynamics of the contestwhether it is share a post, comment, likeamong many others.

Manage the contest

When an activity of this type is carried out, it is best to use a tool that allows you to analyze everything you need with the same. This will let you know how effective it is or is not. For this, it is recommended to use the platform hoot-suitekeep in mind that it has a version free and one paid.

Evaluate the results

If you are very clear the final objectives of the contestthen you should know how you can measure the success of your goals. To do this you must select which are your key metrics and this way be able to keep a record of them in the time that the draw takes place.

In this case you can examine the following points:

• Traffic.
• Opinions of the products or services.
• Levels of interaction.
• The number of input and followers.