Sweepstake Application Ideas for Brands

There are a number of techniques used by Facebook application developers to increase the number of users on the application. One of the most favorable and easy techniques to capture the attention of the users is to create sweepstakes applications. It is not a new idea by any means, as a number of brands have used sweepstakes to receive high levels of engagement from the users in the past.

Facebook pages, often only require a bit of incentive (in the form of a prize) to boost the level of engagement with the users. This not only would give a reason to people for constantly checking your page, it would also increase the brand awareness and more importantly provide a chance to increase the number of fans interacting on the page.

Quite often, contests and sweepstakes are mistakenly considered to be the same. But there is a difference between them. Contests require skillful interaction from the player to win the prize, while on the other hand, in sweepstakes users can enter their details and through a lucky draw, they can be the winner. There are no special skills required in winning a sweepstake (just luck).

To better understand the sweepstakes applications concept, have a look at a video walk-through of a sweepstakes app Cygnis Media has designed and developed for IGN & Capcom, to promote their new game Dragon’s Dogma.

Keeping the difference between Sweepstakes and Contests in mind, we have created a list of sweepstakes application ideas, which managed to generate good results:

1 – Free for Fans:

Provide your fans a chance to win free prizes. Southwest Airlines offered free round trip tickets for the destinations it flies. The only thing required for a user to do is to fill out the form and provide the information required to enter the sweepstakes.

2 – Multiple Sweepstakes Entries:

You can offer your fans to enter the sweepstakes multiple times (thus increasing their chances of winning) by asking them to Like your page and other affiliate pages. This technique was utilized in the Dragon’s Dogma application, as users were able to get a second entry into the sweepstakes by Liking Capcom’s Dragon’s Dogma page.

3 – Fan Preferences:

You can show your fans a few different options and ask them to choose one. The options can be of products, music albums, videos, people, or anything that you think would work with your brand.

4 – Pick a Door:

The user can be presented with a few doors at the start; one of the doors would lead them to win an entry in the sweepstakes. The prizes can change over time.

5 – Guess the Place:

A nice brain teaser for your fans, you just need to take a picture of your product at a famous location (but make sure the place is easily identified by the fans, so that large number of fans can interact without hesitation) and ask your fans to guess the name of the place where the picture was taken. The correct answers would enter a lucky draw to win the prize.

6 – Pictures with a Twist:

In this technique you can morph an image of a celebrity and ask your fans to guess the celebrity. Whoever gives the correct answer would be entered in a lucky draw for a chance to win the grand prize. Such applications are famous, as this type of application can capture the attention of all types of age groups and provides favorable results.

7 – Follow us:

Make sure you use other marketing resources as well to promote your brand. Ask your fans to follow you on Twitter to earn another entry into the sweepstakes.

CONCLUSION:

You may find some more ideas through your own brainstorming process, which we highly encourage you to do. We would love to hear from you about more ideas for Sweepstakes applications.