Contests, giveaways and sweepstakes on social media can be powerful tools for increasing brand visibility and engaging audiences – and when executed effectively they can also yield invaluable audience insights.
Tag-a-friend giveaways are timeless classics, providing participants with value by encouraging them to share contest posts with their social networks, and hoteliers can quickly implement them with minimal hassle.
Choose a Prize That’s Relevant to Your Hotel
Social media contests and giveaways can be an excellent way to raise brand recognition, engage existing audiences and reach new ones. But for maximum effectiveness, successful giveaways require careful planning and strategic execution – to achieve optimal results start by setting SMART objectives!
Establishing goals for your social media contest can help you identify key performance indicators (KPIs) to gauge its success, as well as make evaluating its efficacy easier once it has concluded.
Objectives should be specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and time-bound for maximum effect. They should also align with the type of contest being run; for example, likes, shares and comments are great metrics for measuring participation while engagement can help measure viewings or plays on videos.
Consider how you will select a winner of your social media contest carefully before moving forward with it. There are various methods of doing this, with random name selector software being one popular method online that’s easy to use; even screen recording it to show that it was truly random! Alternatively, consider using tools that collect participant data such as location, email address and the social media accounts they follow which allows you to easily select a winner once the contest ends.
An important aspect of running a social media contest is how long it should run for. You don’t want it to run too long as this could become dull and people lose interest quickly – aim for two to four weeks at most for maximum effectiveness.
Understanding your objectives and KPIs will enable you to select an appropriate type of contest, as well as its duration. Furthermore, familiarizing yourself with each social media platform’s rules and guidelines before initiating a contest will prevent legal issues and ensure it runs in compliance with its respective guidelines.
Set Up a Landing Page
Hotel landing pages are dedicated webpages created specifically to drive conversions. By highlighting one feature or offer on your hotel and encouraging action more aggressively than regular websites do, landing pages can help boost conversion rates when running paid search and social media ads campaigns.
Starting by designing an eye-catching mobile-friendly landing page that features your hotel’s best and most captivating features, such as images of its inviting rooms, amenities like pools and restaurants, scenic views, an elegant lobby or entranceway, scenic vistas or drone footage to give visitors an accurate impression of staying with you.
Next, highlight any authentic reviews or recommendations your hotel has received from past guests, travel media professionals or travel experts. This type of social proof builds credibility and trust among potential guests – it may make a big difference whether or not they decide to book at your hotel.
Finally, include an irresistibly inviting Call-to-Action (CTA) that motivates visitors to book their stay immediately with your hotel. A strong CTA should use an active verb and link directly to your booking site – keeping this CTA visible will increase conversions on your landing page and maximize its conversion rates.
Make sure to feature your hotel logo prominently on your landing page to establish brand recognition among your target audience, which could increase direct bookings.
Increased Lead Generation
A well-designed landing page can capture visitor information through email opt-ins or newsletter signups, giving you the ability to build targeted marketing lists while engaging visitors through personalized offers or reminders. A lead magnet could even increase signups by up to 50%!
Landing pages are one of the best tools available for driving hotel advertising campaigns and converting them into profitable direct bookings. By using Unicorn Platform, it’s easy to build attractive hotel landing pages optimized for mobile usage that generate leads and sales opportunities.
Host a Contest
Contests generate user-generated content, which helps build trust with participants and encourages participation in future contests. Furthermore, this can give valuable insights into your audience’s interests and preferences; you could repurpose this material in future marketing efforts such as social media channels or websites.
Planning a contest begins by setting clear objectives. Your goals should be specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and time-bound to help guide the success of your campaign. With your objectives in place, creating an action plan and tracking the campaign becomes simpler.
Selecting an appealing prize for your contest is key. Your prize should align with the goal of your campaign, so as to be appealing to existing and new audiences alike. For example, if your aim is to increase followers on Instagram pages such as yours, ask contestants to tag friends in comments or send their friends an invitation link – this will boost the campaign by reaching newer audiences than otherwise possible.
Rules are just as essential in running an effective contest, as having clear rules will help avoid confusion and discourage unqualified entries. Furthermore, making entry as simple as possible will increase participation – for example asking participants for too many fields can turn them away and collecting personal data without consent can result in fines or legal issues. It is recommended to use reliable software when managing online contests to keep copies of all submissions as backup should issues arise during any submissions or submissions.
Make sure your contest is promoted effectively before its end date. Depending on your budget, social media ads can help build awareness and hype up potential participants about the giveaway. For optimal results, try running ads for two to four weeks, with an in-place touchpoint plan to maintain momentum throughout.
An effective giveaway can be one of the best ways to expand your social media following and foster engagement, but don’t expect it to solve all your business’s woes on its own. Use giveaways as part of an overall marketing strategy, and evaluate their performance afterward so you can continue improving upon it.
Announce the Winners
Social media contests can be an excellent way to drive awareness and engagement of both large hotel groups as well as independent boutique properties. By choosing an attractive prize, content, headline, and image that will entice potential guests, contests can bring more exposure and engagement with your brand – but make sure you follow all legal considerations and know how to effectively monitor and track campaigns so you don’t run afoul of social media rules!
One of the most effective types of social media contests involves inviting participants to tag friends or repost a photo for a chance at winning something. This type of competition not only requires participation from current followers and new ones alike, but it can also target entrants by geography – increasing your chances of attracting local followers who may be more inclined to follow your hotel and its content in general.
Running a photo/video contest to promote your hotel can also be an excellent way of increasing engagement, garnering likes, comments and shares from participants and showing the authenticity of your property.
Finally, consider hosting a giveaway or sweepstakes. A sweepstakes is a game in which participants have the chance to win an incentive by adhering to specific rules outlined on a website or app – similar to lotteries but free for entry, making them an effective marketing strategy for hotels.
Once your contest is over, it’s important to announce and thank its participants. When choosing a winner you may choose based on creativity or speed of submission of entry – or you could simply pick them randomly! Regardless of what approach you use it is essential that the rules include such information so all participants know what to expect.
Once the contest has come and gone, it’s important to carefully assess its results and examine how effective your campaign was. Tools are available that allow you to monitor hashtag and keyword usage, follower count and engagement rate; all these metrics can help determine how successful your campaign was.