I realize this is not tied directly to Tess software. However, since there are Tess conference sessions and webinars on digital trends, digital marketing, etc., I hope it is OK to ask this question via the Marketing forum.
Have you run a contest on Facebook for your organization?
“Rock of Ages” [arena rock musical set in the 80’s] is coming to our venue at the end of January. Starting next week, I’d like to hold an “80’s Big Hair” photo contest on our Facebook page to help spark interest in the production. I’d love to hear from anyone who’s done a photo contest on FB, where fans submit photos to be entered into a prize drawing.
This seemed easy to me until I Googled “Facebook contests” - and saw all the legal warnings to protect against spam and false contests.
Basically, fans will be invited to post their best (biggest) 80’s hair photo to enter the contest.
We’ll post start/end date for submissions, no purchase necessary. LEGAL: Facebook is neither a partner nor a sponsor in this contest.
And announce the winner on FB, blog, twitter, etc.
If you’ve done something similar, did you create a photo album and ask fans to post directly to that album? I’d like to have all the photos in one place when it comes time to judge them – and have one spot where fans can see all the photos together.
I’m thinking each new photo posted to the album would also show up on our wall?
In regard to contacting the winner, I just plan to send them a message on Facebook.
Any input would be appreciated!
Chris
Hi Chris,
We held a similar Facebook contest last year when we presented Steel Magnolias and asked individuals to post 'bad hair' photos to our fan page.
We offered a prize from a local hair salon to tie-in with the show but I wasn't too happy with the results; we only a few entries, although our Sound Designer put up some interesting past photos of himself! It was our first effort of a photo contest and seeing as our patrons are generally older and not necessarily familiar with Facebook, it may have been too much effort or confusing for our patrons to post pictures. We also thought they may not have be interested in posting "embarrassing" photos from their past. :)
Regarding keeping them in one place, we did find some people posted pics on our wall, while others followed the contest instructions and uploaded a picture into the Album we created for the contest, so we had to monitor both sections of our page for entries.
We did try to encourage people to 'like' photos which would be used to declare entries, which also didn't work.
Having said all that, definitely try it. Your Fan Page seems a bit more active than ours and this show definitely lends itself to a similar contest!
Have fun!