If you have a company or a brand you want to promote, running a giveaway is a great way to get some publicity and brand recognition for next to nothing, especially if you’re inviting people to join via social networks. A good giveaway can create a lot of buzz around your product and/or company in a completely organic way.

But when creating an event like this, there are some things to keep in mind, and we will cover them all in the rest of this article. You’d be surprised how easy it is to forget some pretty basic details when setting things up.

What kind of giveaway do you want?

There are several factors to consider when choosing the right type of giveaway for you. First, you need to choose where to host it: you can do that on your website, your social media accounts, or even via e-mail, although this last method may be a tad out of date. By now, you must’ve come across at least one giveaway on social media, and these can be absolutely massive for you.

Giveaway on social media

Apart from the platform, you need to decide what kind of giveaway that’ll be – do people have to do something in order to qualify (comment, post a picture, guess something, etc.) or do they just have to be following you, and the prize is awarded completely randomly. The first option seems better to me, especially on social networks, because if you require people to comment or post pictures on your social network profile or below the post announcing the giveaway, the reach you’ll have will just keep growing – all by itself! You won’t have to lift a finger.

The most important things about running a giveaway

The main reason why all those people want to participate in a giveaway is to win a prize (shocking, I know). Therefore, the prize itself has to be something that will appeal to a lot of people, something that is representative of what you’re trying to promote and something the people interested in you will be interested in. It makes no sense to be giving away a set of tools if you’re somebody who deals with sports or video games. Also, it is a very good idea to use some special occasions to your advantage – if you run a hotel, you can offer a room for two for Valentine’s Day, for example.

Apart from that, make sure that the rules of your giveaway are clearly articulated and that you let people know when the deadline is. Once the contest is over, announce the winner publicly to let everyone know that you weren’t just pulling their leg.

Best plugins for giveaways

But if you have a WordPress website, all you need for a successful giveaway is a good plugin. There are plenty of those floating around, so allow us to introduce you to the best options you have at this moment.

Photo / Video Contest WordPress Plugins by GalleryPlugins

Photo Video Contest

Yes, Photo and Video Contest WordPress Plugins by GalleryPlugins are two separate plugins, but they come from the same company and are quite similar, so we’ll count them as one. The title is pretty self-explanatory: these things allow you to create contests based on photos and videos. You are in complete control here and are able to always monitor comments, submissions, and stuff like that, plus you get an unlimited number of contests, unlimited free updates, and much, much more. For 25$, this is an excellent deal if this is your niche.

KingSumo

King Sumo

KingSumo has been around for a while, which can only serve as a testament to its quality. It is extremely simple to use, with a very intuitive interface and plenty of useful options, and you can literally set a giveaway up in a minute. The product is focused on building your e-mail list by allowing people who take certain actions additional entries and increased chances in the giveaway. Through this, growing your following on all platforms becomes a breeze. 19$ a month could very well be a great investment in this case.

Simple Giveaways

simple giveaways

Simple Giveaways is just that – simple. Clear and easy-to-use interface means that even a complete beginner can set up a giveaway without any trouble at all. What’s particularly interesting is the fact that it also comes as a free version, although this is fairly limited in what it can to compared to the premium version. If you opt to pay 49.99$ a month, you will be able to let Simple Giveaways decide who wins all on its own, easily connect with all kinds of social and marketing platforms many other awesome things.

Gleam

Gleam can also be a very good solution for giveaways. While it may not be as simple to use as some previous entries on this list, the features it offers more than makeup for it. For example, Gleam is extremely safe, being able to detect frauds and allowing you to ask the participants to verify their e-mail addresses. Pricing is also interesting because you can get the full package, which costs almost 100$, but if you only want to organize giveaways, the feature just for that for only 10$.

Conclusion

Giveaways can do wonders for you and your brand if you deploy them in the right way. Ask the participants to share the news, and your reach can just keep on growing. This is especially the case on social networks, but even if you’re doing this on your WordPress website, you can reap some huge benefits. To help you out will all that there are many different plugins at your disposal, so see what kind of contest you want to create, and it can go live in a matter of minutes. Just make sure you plan everything out (prizes, deadlines, and stuff like that), and you will start feeling the positive impact very, very soon.

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Marko Domljanovic

This former student of English studies has been around blogs, SEO, keywords and all that good stuff for more than five years now. During that time he has written about a variety of topic, always being careful to fully optimize his every text, obviously. When he's not writing, he's probably on some kind of a trip, with his trusty laptop always at his side.

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