Everyone loves giveaways–who doesn’t love receiving something useful, informative, or fun for free? Many businesses distribute free promotional items, prizes, instructional or how-to documents, and marketing materials to prospective clients, often at trade shows and other promotional events. You already know how important it is to promote your brand and business online, so why not incorporate digital giveaways into your marketing and sales strategies, including digital prize giveaways or even an iOS and Android app specifically designed for your business?
Popular Digital Giveaways Include:
1) Digital Documents, Files, and Presentations: Your business can distribute instructional and marketing materials to prospective clients through digital downloads. When doing so, it is important to ensure that you are distributing files in file formats that are universally accessible, including PDF files and industry-standard Office file formats for documents, spreadsheets, and presentations. Be sure to include the name of your business, branding elements, and contact information with each file. Additional giveaway ideas to promote your business include:
- Memberships for an online course, event, workshop, or community
- A discount on your subscription packages, services, or digital products
- eBooks or downloadable guides with information regarding your industry
- A free consultation or initial video appointment
- Free templates, checklists, or access to limited resources
- Limited edition digital goods, products, and services
2) Digital Giveaways and Prizes: With so much great content now being distributed digitally, including music, movies, apps, games, and books, many of your prospective clients would love a digital prize, such as codes for popular online stores like Apple’s iTunes, Google Play and Amazon’s digital services. As with any other contest or giveaway, you cannot require that an applicant completes a purchase or signs an agreement in order to be eligible for the contest.
Digital giveaways that include content codes redeemable through an online storefront provide a new and novel way to conduct a giveaway – simply post the code to your blog or social media account and the first reader or follower to discover and submit it can redeem it! Not only is this a fun and exciting experience, but it encourages readers and followers to pay attention to your posts in the future.S ome other digital giveaway ideas include:
- Digital gift cards or coupon codes
- Digital event tickets or QR codes
- Digital movie tickets
3) Your Own App: Since the introduction of the first iPhone, smartphone users have fallen in love with apps, or applications, for portable digital devices such as smartphones and tablets. Billions of apps have been downloaded by users of devices made and supported by Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android operating systems, and your business can submit your own app! However, as exciting as having your own app may sound, there are caveats. An app requires both an initial and ongoing investment of money and resources. The app must be designed, coded, and tested for bugs and errors, and once the app is launched, it has to be continually updated to fix newly-discovered bugs, add and remove features and content, and ensure that it is compatible with newer versions of each operating system. As of 2015, most apps are only released for Apple and Android devices due to the dominant market share of those two platforms.
Social Media Giveaway Examples
Social media giveaways are a great way to help grow your business quickly.
Running a quick social media giveaway can help you attract potential customers and gather new leads. Growing your social media presence is also an amazing way to speak to your customers directly, answer questions, and get them excited about upcoming events or promotions. Some examples include:
- Share a photo contest
- Submit a video
- Comment to win content
- Refer a friend to win contest
- Hashtag challenge contest
- Holiday-themed contest
- Contest to celebrate reaching a milestone or goal
- Randomly chosen winners selected from a pool of subscribers, followers, or other customer loyalty programs
Benefits of Giveaways
Not only can digital giveaways lead to increased conversions, sales, or revenue for your business in the long term, but they can also help with:
- Attracting new social media followers
- Boosting brand awareness and visibility
- Building customer and brand loyalty
- Expanding your email, subscription, or contact lists
- Generating more conversions and traffic to your site
Strike A Balance Between Physical And Digital
Digital giveaways shouldn’t replace physical giveaways at trade shows and other events. All of your prospective and existing customers are not equally “plugged in” – some may not have smartphones, while others may not feel comfortable or simply choose not to consume digital media. Continually tweak your sales and marketing strategies in order to find a good balance that works for your specific industry and client base.