Contest Ideas

Contests Drive Performance 

In a constantly evolving and competitive marketplace, businesses are always on the lookout for new and creative ways to boost performance, draw customers, or promote customer loyalty. Running contests that feature travel incentives as a prize is a great way to reach these goals. There are various contest ideas that can be used to target either your employees or your customers.

Contests are a Proven Motivator
Why reward customer loyalty by way of contests and travel incentives? Because it works, and because several businesses are already using this tactic. A 2014 study by Incentive Federation Inc. found that a majority of US businesses, 74% to be exact, use non-cash rewards (travel incentives, gift cards, etc.) to recognize the loyalty of customers, sales teams and other audiences essential to their success. These businesses, ranging in size from small to large firms and corporations, spent $76.9 billion annually–$22.5 billion of which was used on travel incentives. Identifying with the people that your business is comprised of and developing unique contest ideas can drive sales, increase customer loyalty and even draw in new customers. And implementing a contest is a great way to do it. There are so many ways to run a contest, so where do you start? We’ve created this simple ideas section to give you some great examples of what other clients of ours have run in the past:

How it Works

You will receive from us lovely four colour 8 1/2 x 11 brochures that are sure to impress your customers. Inside of each brochure is a certificate which is date stamped and has a unique identifiable code. Also included is a 1-800 number, and once you hand out the certificate to your prize winner we take care of everything to ensure your customer has a positive and memorable experience from the gift you gave them!

Social Media Contests
As mentioned earlier, it’s a great idea to prompt your customers to share their entries on their social media pages. We all know that people love to share the simplest things on their social media pages and why wouldn’t they want to show their creative genius to the world? So, when customers can share entries via Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, etc., this exposes your contest to their friends and family. Also, generating promotional contests via social media allows you to reach customers, who not only live in your community, but in other areas of the country. This broadens your audience in a big way. What’s also great about customers entering your social media contest is that they’re essentially doing a lot of the marketing for you. When they share their entries/winnings and their friends and family see it, this is great advertising for your business. This is easily done especially if you are using several social media platforms to advertise your contest.

Twitter also allows for some simple social media contest ideas such as Hashtag Contests or the fastest correct answer contest. With hashtags, you can ask your customers to use a specific hashtag in their tweets, or link a video/photo that you’ve posted to their tweets. Then, randomly select the winner from the people who posted. Also, when hosting an
online show/webinar, ask the viewers a question and announce that the answer will be given at the end of the webinar (this keeps them watching until the end). Whoever answers the question correctly first, will get the prize.

 Facebook Contest Case Study

Trip to Las Vegas. 

Contact Lens Company

Contact lenses used to have fat margins for optometrists, but when e-commerce companies came along the margin shrank and the customers ability to jump to the competitor commoditized this business. So how do you get a marketing edge to drive sales volume? Enter social media marketing. And along with that getting eyeballs to pages in order to convert to sales using contest turned out to be a winning combination!

Overall Rating

Ease of Use

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Website Contests
When customers enter social media contests, give them a link that takes them to your website. This is a great marketing strategy for your company as potentially new customers can see what your company has to offer.

What’s also great is that your company can advertise on your website any special website contest idea, special promotion or sweepstakes that may be happening at that time. A great example of this is a Vacation Giveaway Contest, or a Vacation Giveaway with Purchase! Not only will the vacation images instantly grab your customers’ attention, it will also encourage them to inquire about your products sooner to take advantage of the special promotion, and get them to contact you TODAY about purchasing!

Giveaway Contests
As mentioned earlier, it’s a great idea to prompt your customers to share their entries on their social media pages. We all know that people love to share the simplest things on their social media pages, so why wouldn’t they want to show their creative genius to the world?

This broadens your audience in a big way. What’s also great about customers entering your social media contest is that they’re essentially doing a lot of the marketing for you. When they share their entries/winnings and their friends and family see it, this is great advertising for your business. This is easily done especially if you are using several social media platforms to advertise your contest.

Sweepstake Contests
Sweepstake contests can coincide with your social media contests, online contests, giveaway contests, etc., and will also serve the purpose of promoting your business. Sweepstake contests will generate buzz about your brand and company.
Sweepstakes help maximize engagement, are easy to enter, and prompt users to share their entries or winnings on their social media profiles. Also, sweepstake contests ask contestants to put their email down if they want to enter. This will allow you, in the
future, to increase interaction with them and let them know about any other special contests/promotions your company may have.

One common prize when winning a sweepstakes contest is a vacation. Offering travel incentives as a prize for any promotional contest idea is an effective marketing tool. After all, who doesn’t love a free vacation?


Contests Quiz


1) Of the following website functions, which is the most important?

  • a) Having free reports, downloads, etc
  • b) Capturing email addresses of visitors
  • c) Having contact information on every page

2) What's the best way to promote a business with social media?

  • a) To advertise your company, services and products
  • b) Invite potential clients to visit your website
  • c) Offer a lot of helpful and free information

3) The main objective to branding is which of the following?

  • a) To have customers recognize your logo and marketing materials
  • b) To earn trust from your customers
  • c) Having a unique tag line

Reveal the Answers

Contests for Employees
Promotional contest ideas aren’t just great for your customers, they can also be great for your employees as well.

Running contests for employees can increase relationships, performance, loyalty, and engagement in the workplace. It can also relieve your employees of some of the stress and frustration that can sometimes build up from a day at work. It’s a great motivator for employees to do a great job when working. If your employees are happy, they’ll complete their tasks more efficiently, which will then help your business. Your employees will provide your customers with great customer service which promotes your company in a positive way. It gives your employees incentives to do an outstanding job.

Additionally, if employees are broken up into teams, a bond could form between coworkers because of the healthy competition. One great contest idea for employees is to organize a raffle. Raffles can be held during company parties and can be organized in a couple of different ways. One way to conduct a raffle is to give your employees a raffle ticket every time they do something good for the company. You could also just draw names out of a hat. This way everyone gets a prize, which is important. If only a select few people in the office are rewarded, others may become discouraged

Learn more about our incentives!

See how incentives from PCR can boost your sales today.