Fear Not the Marketing Contest

David Allison

A&P

Don't be afraid of using a contest in your marketing plan. They're not just for children's cereal anymore.

There was a day when sending three boxtops to the makers of Crunchy Oat Bites might win you a bicycle, and high-end brands avoided this kind of promotional activity like the plague. Not so much anymore. Cohiba cigars gave away a 75,000 dollar vacation last year, complete with a private jet. Cartier, the high-end jewelers, sponsors contest for artists and with a little bit of clicking around on the web you can find contests sponsored by Mercedes, BMW, Louis Vuitton and pretty much any other high-end brand you care to search for.

Correspondingly, mid-level and discount brands are using contests more than they ever did before. There are even multiple websites that aggregate contests for your convenience, to make it easy to learn about how you could win detergent, appliances, furniture: just about anything you can imagine.

I’ve also seen a huge uptick in the number of tiny companies using contests as a way to engage. My own company teamed up with Trevor Linden, former hockey great and newly-minted real estate developer to give away a fundraising tool to charities who wanted to enter. Other small companies use Twitter and Facebook and their own blogging activity to give away everything from cameras to consulting services. My friends at John Fluevog have an ongoing contest, called Open Source Footwear, where anyone can submit a shoe design for consideration, with winners having the shoe named after them and manufactured by the Fluevog team.

So, having established that contests aren’t just for kids anymore, why and how can you use this tool for your brand?

The why is simple: all stigma is gone, and in this information-overload world a contest can be a great way to generate some excitement and engagement for your company.

The how is more complicated. There are many kinds of contests and contest structures as there are companies. No one approach will be right for everyone. This might be an area where expert guidance is a good idea, certainly from a legal perspective (there are a lot of arcane and cumbersome rules whenever you want to give something away), and perhaps from a nuts-and-bolts perspective too.

And how better to end a post on contests than with a contest? If your company has used a contest as a marketing tool, leave a comment in response to this post and describe the contest and the results you generated. I’ll pick the most innovative reply (assuming we get more than three entries) and I’ll donate $100 to the charity of your choice from my own pocket.

So take a moment and engage with me. Enter my contest – and win!

Comments

I am a ventriloquist and

Comment by Anonymous, January 20, 2010 at 12:29

I am a ventriloquist and magician. I recently had a number of brochures printed for my birthday party shows. When I got them, there was a spelling error which I missed and had signed off on the proof.
Rather than toss them, I have a lable on the back that says "Oops. We made a spelling error. Find it and receive $25 off your next show". I have turned an error into a contest. This is still very new so I can't tell you my results yet.

Great idea! Smart. For my

Comment by DavidAllison, January 20, 2010 at 15:50

Great idea! Smart.

For my mobile business card, send the word DAVID as a text message to 82442

I have to both agree and

Comment by cfxcreative, January 20, 2010 at 09:47

I have to both agree and disagree with the sentiments expressed in your article. Certain types of contests - send in a photo of your adorable pet, fill out a survey, etc. - are great ways to generate awareness and encourage consumer participation directly with a brand.

However, on the uglier side of the coin, a different variety of contest has been making waves in the creative community for quite some time - crowdsourcing, aka "design our next [candy package, advertisement, web site, logo] and if we pick your design, you'll win [insert nominal monetary value here]". These sorts of contests are - no two ways about it - just bad business. The client gets un-informed design that is likely to be completely disconnected from the brand's voice, look-and-feel and primary message and all the poor suckers who submit entries - except the one "lucky" winner - waste time on a "contest" that they could have invested in seeking paid work with clients who understand the value of design and its role in effective marketing.

These types of contests essentially ask that people submit creative concepts or designs on "spec", meaning there's no guarantee of compensation for time invested. Can you imagine sending out an invitation to a group of lawyers requesting that each of them draft a will or partnership agreement or letter on your behalf - for FREE! - and you'll choose the one you like best and only the lawyer who submits that entry will be paid for his time. Sound absurd? Of course it is. But, this is a very real situation that creatives - graphic designers, web designers, photographers, etc. - face everyday. Crowdsourcing contests devalue the skill and expertise that creatives bring to the table with regards to branding, marketing, design and business.

In recent memory, I can recall Pepsi, Smarties and, recently, local shoe manufacturer Fluevog - which seems odd, considering that Fluevog is itself a design-based company - running design contests requesting people submit their ideas for free, with no guarantee of compensation and, in some cases, with the fine print reading that the company owns all entries once submitted. This means that, essentially, the company receives free work from potential dozens or even hundreds of entrants and can pick and choose who - if anyone - to compensate for the time invested.

Design associations like the Society of Graphic Designers of Canada work tirelessly to educate businesses and would-be contest entrants alike on why these types of contests are a bad idea for all involved. Unfortunately, it's an uphill battle.

Just wanted to bring into focus another side of seemingly-harmless contests.

Carly H. Franklin
Principal
CFX Creative / BOOST Social Media
www.cfxcreative.com / www.gimmeaboost.com

HI Carly Thanks for the

Comment by DavidAllison, January 20, 2010 at 15:49

HI Carly

Thanks for the comment. My company makes a living, in part, by providing design services, so I too have been watching the trend towards crowd-sourced design quite closely. However, I think it's going to happen no matter what the GDC has to say about it.

It's similar to what the photographers went through -- time was you needed a pro to do anything -- now you can find decent photos for free. So I think change is coming, and that there will always be the clients who want/need to hire a pro, but not as many.

I think the way forward for designers is going to be similar to how the professional photographers have adapted: you'll need to specialize, and provide contextual knowledge to a community of clients more apt to pay for your experience than for your skills. That's what I'm thinking anyway. If you are the designer that has done more car company logos than any other on the planet, you can charge a fee for that.

Thanks for the comment.

David