How to Promote Your Giveaway in 9 Easy Steps

Now that your online giveaway is up and running, all you have to do is wait for people to enter, right?

Not quite.

In fact, the real work begins after your giveaway kicks off. Today, over a hundred giveaways are published online each day, and promotion is what separates the successes from the failures.

In this article, I’ll be showing you how to promote your giveaway in 9 easy steps.

1. Step One: Your Email Newsletter

Today, at least 91% of consumers check their email daily. People who buy products marketed through email spend 138% more than those who do not receive email offers. So promoting your giveaway via email not only raises awareness but boosts your chances of clickthroughs by potential participants.

Worried about how to craft an eye-catching email campaign? You don’t have to be! Start off strong with Wishpond’s beautiful, high-converting email templates. Wishpond’s email automation helps you design campaigns and A/B test without hiring a developer.

3 Tips To Use When Promoting Your Giveaway Via Email

1. Have an Attention-Grabbing Subject line: Your subject lines are like headlines for your emails. Just like no one wants to read an article with a boring headline, no one wants to open boring emails. The next time you send an email, try these 23 Email Copywriting Tips to Skyrocket Conversions.

2. Keep Your Emails Short: If your subscribers wanted to read anything with more than 100 words, they would go straight to your blog, not your email.

3. Send Follow Up Emails: One email isn’t enough; your email can easily be forgotten in a few minutes. Schedule weekly emails to remind and update your subscribers about your contest.

2. Step Two: Update Your Website

Adding a giveaway notice on a sidebar, tab or page on your website is a great way to promote your giveaway to traffic that’s flowing through your site.

You can take it a step further and embed your giveaway directly onto your web pages. Just ensure that the look and feel of your giveaway is reflected on your website for consistency.

Don’t shy away from submitting your giveaway to popular giveaway websites. In fact, here are the Top 18 Websites to Post Any Giveaway or Contest.

You can also add a giveaway pop up to your website to catch some leads. That’s exactly what Envii Beauty did for their Lipstick Bundle Giveaway when they used Wishpond’s Popup feature.

3. Step Three: Branded Hashtags

Creating a branded hashtag for your giveaway is a great way to promote it and helps with SEO. Your branded hashtag can be your brand’s name, the name of the giveaway or a catchy slogan.

It also makes tracking easier. You can see how many people are using it, and how many entries you might have depending on your entry method.

Myprotein uses the hashtag #Myprotein for their social media posts and giveaways.

I found Hootsuite’s Quick and Simple Guide for Hashtags helpful for anyone learning to use hashtags for the first time or those who might want to know the best ways to use them.

4. Step Four: Recruit Influencers

Just like with a product launch or marketing campaign, influencers are powerful ambassadors. With the combined efforts of your influencers’ fanbase and your own following, you now have a better chance at reaching people.

It’s important to keep in mind that your influencer can be a micro or macro influencer. Having an influencer with a large following doesn’t always ensure the results you want. Here, quality is more important than quantity: what matters is that the influencer who partners with your giveaway shares your target audience.

Take, for instance, Influencer Doug the Pug. Doug isn’t shy when it comes to talking about his love for pizza. Dominos teamed up with the pug to host a giveaway for followers to win one year of free Dominos pizza to celebrate #NationalPizzaDay.

It’s the best day of the year! #NationalPizzaDay

?GIVEAWAY! Want free @dominos pizza for a YEAR? RT to enter!?#ad https://t.co/zRwfKHIuiT pic.twitter.com/5uS3fvff0n

— Doug The Pug (@itsdougthepug) February 9, 2018

New to influencer marketing? Before reaching out to an influencer, use this Essential Guide to Getting Started with Influencer Marketing.

5. Step Five: Blog

I’m willing to bet that your blog gets more traffic than your Facebook or Instagram account. So why not post your giveaway on your blog?

You can write an entire article about it on your blog, providing links or images readers can use to enter right in your blog post. You can also drop links to your giveaway in the articles that will be live during your giveaway, giving people interested in your articles the chance to enter.

This works two ways: not only are you informing people about your giveaway, but you’re also building your giveaway’s SEO. If you decide to repeat the same giveaways, you’d be investing in your giveaway long term.

6. Step Six: Get on Social Media

Social media is the best place to let your giveaway grow through paid features or organically.

5 Pro Tips for Promoting Giveaways on Social Media

1. Post Consistently
Posting once about your two-week giveaway isn’t enough to let people know it is still active. Your post can easily be lost in a sea of content being released each day. You want to make sure your post is at the top of their mind.

For example, if your giveaway is only for a week, post at the beginning, middle and right before it ends. You can use giveaway tools like Buffer and Hootsuite to schedule your giveaway post in advance.

2. Add a Sense of Urgency
Instead of the standard “We’re doing a giveaway, join today!” post, instead say “Only 3 hours left to win this giveaway, get in before it’s too late”. Adding a bit of urgency in your social media caption can give viewers the FOMO (fear of missing out) so they’re more likely to click to enter then and there.

Think of your social media post as a mini-landing page, and of each contestant as a lead (because they are). You can use Brian Tracy’s tips for Developing A Sense Of Urgency to help craft compelling captions.

3. Share Your Giveaway in Stories
Your giveaway shouldn’t be limited to your social media feed. Use your Instagram, TikTok, or Facebook stories to promote your giveaways. Unlike posting, you don’t have to limit how often you post your giveaway in your feed. Post your giveaway in your story as often as you’d like. Making an Instagram highlight on your profile is also a plus.

4. Pin Your Giveaway on Facebook and Twitter
When you pin a post on your Facebook or Twitter page, you allow viewers to see your giveaway post at the top of your page before they even start scrolling. Your pinned post puts your content in the spotlight and typically results in higher engagement rates since it’s the first thing visitors see.

To pin a post, go to the post you’d like to pin, click the arrow in the upper-right corner of the post and select “Pin to Top” from the drop-down menu.

Facebook

Twitter

Pro Tip: Pinned posts are time-sensitive which means once the promotion, season or event has ended, it’s best to unpin it, so your page looks up to date.

5. Ask Followers to Repost
Just by simply asking your followers (and influencers) to repost your giveaway on their page, along with your hashtag or tagging you in photos, you advertise your giveaway for free.

7. Step Seven: Sponsored Ads

Take it a step further and advertise your giveaway with sponsored ads on your social media platforms. If your giveaway is going to be a month-long, then feel free to add Google ads to the mix.

The key thing to note is that you have to be very specific with your audience if you want to put your sponsored ad in front of the right people.

8. Step Eight: Start a Marketing Campaign

Based on how big your prize is or how long you’ll be running your giveaway, you might need to take a broader approach and have a marketing campaign around your giveaway.

Your giveaway’s marketing campaign can consist of everything listed above along with traditional marketing (if you have a physical location or store).

Poler Outdoor Stuff is known to have giveaways now and then, but they also run a full marketing campaign, including a referral program, to drive awareness and increase entries.

With Wishpond, you can manage your giveaway’s marketing campaign all in one place, plus integrate any additional apps or software you’re already using like MailChimp, Zaiper, or Salesforce.

9. The Afterparty: Post-Promotion

Your giveaway doesn’t end after you select your winner. It ends when you announce the end of your giveaway and welcome your newfound followers.

After your giveaway, you can use user-generated content or create a follow-up post letting them know that they can look out for more giveaways now that they’ve followed your page or joined your email newsletter list.

When your giveaway period ends, it’s up to you to keep your new leads engaged. Try and share exclusive, just-for-those-who-entered offers or discounts. Always measure your giveaway results and analyze their performance to ensure that your next giveaway is just as successful – if not better.

Summary

Here are 9 easy steps to promote your giveaway:
1. Email Newsletter
2. Update Your Website
3. Branded Hashtags
4. Recruit Influencers
5. Blog
6. Get on Social Media
7. Sponsored Ads
8. Start a Marketing Campaign
9. Post-Promotion

Have you ever hosted a giveaway for your brand? Drop some of your own expert tips in the comments below. I’d love to hear them.