10 Giveaway ideas for businesses – Contest Ideas for better engagement

Nothing works more than two-sided communication on social media. Be it a small business or a big brand, one will find recognition and prominence only if it engages with its audience. And, one of the most important ways for engagement is a contest. Organising a contest can be a cumbersome and full-time job but one worth investing in. But one thing that really makes your contest successful is the giveaways that you offer to winners. Hence, writing this blog to suggest 10 Giveaway ideas for businesses

Let’s be ready to make your contests a huge success

What is a contest?

A contest post is a post that you specifically post for engagement. Through this post, you ask your audience to participate by doing tasks. For example, you can ask questions or you can ask the audience to tag friends. For more details on the contest, read this post on how to promote a small business on Instagram

Before starting with giveaway ideas for businesses, it is important to know the objective of the contest.

By objective, I mean what results you can expect from contests. All the giveaways and contest main participation can be around these objectives.

• More followers– In digital, one needs to decide objectives before organizing any activity. This will align all your contest strategy with the results you want from the contest
• More engagement– If your page on social doesn’t receive much engagement then organizing a contest can help making your page more active. People tend to like & comment more on your contest post.
• Branding – Best benefit of contests can be more and more people can know about your business through tagging. If you want to know about branding, read this post on how to do branding
• Get more enquires – If the contest post is executed well, there is no doubt that the relevant audience would like to know more about your business. This will eventually lead to more enquires
• Boost your applications for a new opening – I have never seen this contest done by any brand but can be highly useful as it can attract a lot of relevant applications for new openings. Stay tuned, will talk about this in detail in the giveaway ideas for businesses section

Now let’s move to 10 giveaway ideas for businesses

Here with 10 giveaway ideas, we will be discussing at what stage in your businesses you can offer the contest and these giveaways. These can be beneficial for your business and can give long term results and help in building brand on social media

1. Vouchers related to business

The main objective of any digital marketing activity be it a campaign or anything on social is to attract the audience who is your potential customers. For such an audience, it is important to have giveaways that are related to your business offerings. For example, if you are having a gym then offering food products goodies that have protein drinks or healthy snackers is a good idea. Let’s read below when any brand can organize such contests

Ideal time to have such giveaways

When you just start with social media page, it is advised to have more generic giveaways (as discussed below). But, when you think your page has enough audience and that too is mixture of relevant and generic audience then go with giveways which are related to business

2. Shopping Vouchers for better engagement & participation

This is basic and the most powerful giveaway for any business. Vouchers that you can offer to the audience can be Amazon voucher, Myntra voucher, any beauty brand like Nykaa voucher or if your target audience is men then voucher can be of Bombay shaving company etc. Organizing a contest doesn’t mean you need to offer a handsome amount of voucher but anything that comes in your budget. It can be Rs. 500 or Rs.1000 voucher too

When to give such giveaways?

I have mentioned this point earlier too in my blog posts that we need to have enough follower base to attract relevant audience and engagement. These types of contests can be organised any time so that your page doesn’t go dead. And, very important to include such contest as part of your social media calendar.

3. Free Trial for a month or week

It is the best way to kill reluctance of your audience who are in indecisive mode. Also, can help you out stand your competitors. People are already looking for services/ products that your brand offers. And then free trial can be a huge attractive point for customers.

Best time to give such giveaways

Once you have significant followers on social media, you can start with these giveaways. The best time will be when a lot of enquiries are coming through social media but audience is not converting. Then such giveaways can boost engagement on your contests

4. Free first-time consultation

This giveaway is included in this post on giveaway ideas for businesses as it can be the most attractive giveaway for businesses who offer consultation or charges as per visits. Most relevant for nutritionists, dietitians, trainers, teachers, clinics etc

Apt time for such giveaways

All such giveaways which directly related to brand and its offerings must be given when brand has some customer base or social media presence.

5. Offer lifetime discount to winner

This giveaway can be the best way to gain credibility among audience also a step towards building long term relationship with audience. This giveway can be tweaked basis your budget or frequency can be reduced if not economical.

Right time to offer such giveaway

These types of giveaways make sense when a lot of participation can come and it is explicit to the audience that there is a huge competition to get such giveaways. These types of giveaways contest performance will also depend on how well the contest is executed. Read this post on why to boost Instagram post for the detailed explanation

6. Discount on specific services

Who doesn’t like discounts? If your brand offerings are of huge price and offering it for free can be loss then offer discount on the services. Use the best ways to communicate credibility and trust of your brand. Excite audience with your offering and then launch contest with such giveaways

Right time is when brand is established

Right time to organize such contests is when brand has some recognition and services/ products are desired by audience

7. Collaboration giveaways with related businesses

Collaborate with other related businesses that your audience can be highly interested in. Giveaways need to make a complete package that audience can’t resist but participate and aim to win

Ideal time for such giveaways

Focus on branding and reach then aim for such contests.

8. Complimentary gifts to complete the set or package

Who doesn’t like offers or complimentary gifts? So while giving such giveaways make sure you include complimentary gifts that are related to your brand or from the brand. For example, a clothing business can offer a complimentary gift as jewelry with communication as buy a look.

Right time for giveaways

These giveaways will fall in general category so one can choose giveaways type of contest anytime. These can be used while somebody just started social media or even while it has been year being on social media

9. Special perks for employees

Most of the brand when organise contests they never involve employees or accept entries from employees. One thing that can be done here is special giveaways for brand members who participates or organise a special contest specific for employees. This is very important factor that makes audience believes how company loves employees. Also, will create excitement among audience to wait for contest that is open for all

Best time for such giveaways

One can choose these giveaways anytime as these will help your audience believe in your brand.

10. Referral benefits for everyone

I have never seen organizing contests around job openings. These can be highly engaging and will benefit the brand in terms of relevant applications. Communication can go around lines such as “Who says only employees get referral benefits”. This is an unconventional giveaway idea hence included in this post giveaway ideas for businesses

Ideal time for giveaways

This idea can be followed as and when required. Whenever one has one or multiple opening such contests can be executed

Hope you like these giveaway ideas for businesses. Looking forward to more contests from brands on social media