Social media competitions are a useful technique to assist B&Bs in their marketing goals, improve their online presence, and drive direct bookings.
Here’s 3 important marketing aspirations for hoteliers and how you can use social media competitions to reach them:
Goal #1 Increasing Followers
Use a social media competition that requires people to like and follow your account before they can participate. In addition, incorporate an incentive for the participant to share the contest on their own social media accounts. This will increase the visibility of the competition and draw more participants.
Another way to promote your contest is through paid social ads. This works best if you have a reasonable following already, then you can target people who would be most interested in the competition you are offering.
Best competition type to use: Instant Win
With instant win your customer is immediately promised something for a simple task. For example, “Free breakfast when you like and share our page.”
Goal #2 Build Your Email List
Similarly you can use social media competitions to ask potential customers to provide their name and email address during registration.
Then, even if they do not win, you can follow up with an email campaign offering competition related discounts such as “Thanks for participating in our competition, we want everyone to be a winner so here’s 10% off your next stay with us”.
Best competition to use: Sweepstakes
With a sweepstake contest you simple ask participants to comment their name and email before picking a winner at random to receive the prize. Hoteliers can increase bookings by positioning the prize as something the customer will receive when booking a room at your hotel: “Comment your name and email below for your chance to win a $100 bar tab when you stay at our B&B.”
Goal #3 Grow Engagement And Drive Traffic.
Customers are far more likely to engage with this type of fun and competitive content. You can even use campaigns which ask customers to create their own content and tag you, such as instagram photo competitions.
With your page traffic increasing make sure you have a way to take bookings straight from your Facebook page by integrating a commission-free booking engine.
Best competition to use: Rewards
This is where your customer is instantly rewarded for interacting with your page. For example: “Like us on facebook to receive a $10 voucher for our B&B”.
The guidelines for a reward competition can be anything from sharing content to commenting or tagging a friend.
Best practice tips for creating a social media competition:
Offer prizes that appeal to your target market: If you are a B&B which mainly attracts families consider offering free kids meals.
Make sure to advertise the prize clearly in the headline and that there is a time limit.
Don’t ask for complex personal information beyond name and email, customers will be less likely to give out their information if you ask for too much.
74% of social media marketers use visual assets in their social media marketing so be sure to decorate your competition post with a high res image.
There are many different competitions you can run, so don’t be afraid to get creative!
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