Instagram contests for business they're
a great way to increase your engagement
and your reach plus the rules are way
more relaxed than they are for Facebook
contests today I'm going to show you how
to run an Instagram contest for your
business as well as some ideas that you
can use for your brand hello busy people
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out a new video every week my name is
Jerry Potter yes it rhymes with the boy
wizard you can connect with me on social
media here and today we are talking all
about Instagram contests for businesses
they're a great way to grow your account
increase your reach increase your
engagement today we'll cover how to do
in Instagram contests some contest ideas
you can use for your business we'll
cover a few tips and tricks along the
way and the one thing that every
Instagram contest has to have to be
legal okay this is important we'll get
into all of that right now
so the first step figure out what is the
goal for your contest are you trying to
grow your account increase your
engagement rate are you trying to get
users to take pictures of their using
your products and so you have more
content to use from them are you trying
to drive people somewhere off of
Instagram like to your website or
something like that figure out what your
goal is that is definitely step 1 now
you can't have more than one goal like
oh I want to do all of those things but
at some point it gets a little bit
confusing so really have one primary
goal to focus on next pick your prize
what are you going to give away now pick
something that would appeal primarily to
your ideal customer like anybody can say
oh we're giving away an Apple watch or
and Samsung phone or a dinner gift
certificate and everyone's like oh cool
I want to enter that but a lot of those
people are just looking for your free
stuff they'll never buy from you and
they'll never come back and engage with
your account again
unless you're gonna do another contest
so what would appeal to your ideal
customer if you're a product based
company give away samples of your
product if your product is too expensive
like let's say I met a guy the other day
who builds bicycles for people that's
too expensive to give away but maybe you
give away a bicycle accessory you might
even be able to find a bicycle accessory
company that would give you one for free
to give away just for the exposure or
maybe you can give a gift card away to
your company if you're in the service
industry give away a free service it
might be yours it might not be for
example I target entrepreneurs who are
looking to grow their digital marketing
and I could offer something that I do or
I could pair up with an accountant and
give away two hours of free accounting
advice for somebody setting up their
business that would appeal to the same
target demographic now I know I blew off
mass appeal prizes like an iPad or a
restaurant gets to forget earlier but if
you do run a business to where everybody
or almost everybody needs you eventually
real estate agents something like that
then you can do more mass appeal prizes
and it can still make sense
next how are people going to enter the
contest do they have to like the post
that'll help you some in the algorithm
do they have to leave a comment that
will help you a little bit more in the
algorithm asking people to tag a friend
in the comments will bring a lot more
people to your account that weren't
there before it is a great way to reach
people that are not following you and
actually that's illegal in a Facebook
contest you can't ask people to tag
somebody in a Facebook contest but on
Instagram still legal as of now hurry up
and do it I would just suggest asking
people to tag a specific friends not
like tag your friend Sarah
but tag a friend like if let's say your
clothing company you're giving away a
blue shirt tag a friend who loves to
wear blue that way you're bringing in
people who might actually become your
customers you can ask people to tag two
or three friends if you want don't ask
people to tag ten friends to enter your
contest that's just annoying great thing
to do with the Tiger friend is if you
can offer two prizes for example if you
have two blue shirts tag a friend that
also likes blue shirts will pick one of
you to win and your friend Newton tag
will also win a blue shirt if you want
to have more content to use on your
Instagram account or Facebook or
anywhere else you can do a
user-generated content
contest this is where you ask people to
take pictures of themselves using your
product or of your product in weird
places whatever your goal is and then
you get all of these pictures that you
can use I had a client and this was a
few years ago in their defense but it
was a restaurant and they didn't want to
take pictures of their food they thought
it was a waste of time and money so we
ran a take a picture of your food
contest so we could have pictures of
food and some people you know smartphone
pictures were terrible but others were
beautiful so we finally had pictures of
the food to use on social media so tell
them to post a photo of whatever you
want on their Instagram account and
either tag you in the photo or use your
special hashtag make sure it's not a
hashtag that everybody is using and
that's their entry just remember though
even though they entered your contest
you still didn't have to ask them if you
can reuse the photo on your own account
but most people will say yes and because
you're asking more of somebody now like
hey take a photo and upload it to your
own account of using our product make
sure your prizes worth it the more
you're asking if somebody the better
your prize needs to be and finally maybe
your goal is to take people off of
Instagram maybe to sign up for your
email list or view something on your
website that's fine that's where you'll
be setting them to your profile to click
on the link and sign up for whatever it
might be now this will not help your
engagement as much if they're not liking
or commenting so you might ask them to
leave a comment and then click the link
in our profile and sign up to win so
that way you kind of win both worlds
again you're asking more of people so
make sure the prize is worth it couple
more important things to remember for
Instagram contests for businesses and
then we'll talk about the legal part
which is important decide when the
contest is going to start and end make
sure that's listed everywhere the
contest has happened another thing you
can do for your followers is once the
contest is over change the caption go in
and edit the caption make the first
thing maybe in all caps even contest has
ended that's just a courtesy so you
don't have people entering and then
finding out later it's over and being
mad at your brand you may need to post
about your contest more than once if
your audience is not used to you doing
contests or your audience isn't very big
you might have to kind of keep nudging
and reminding with multiple posts make
sure you check on your contest
frequently okay this is important for
two reasons one once your contest is up
if something's wrong with it or it's
hard to enter the link doesn't work
it might be somebody's gonna point it
out they're gonna comment and you don't
want that to go a whole day or two if
people going doesn't work this sucks
boohoo unfollow you want to make sure to
fix it right away
the second reason to make sure to engage
with your contest is everything as
people enter if you reply and thank them
and favorite their entries in the
comments and all of those things that
will help you in the algorithm to show
your contest to more people and you want
that right and another way to increase
your results is to team up with another
brand and run a contest between your
accounts where your cross-promoting
certainly more work to set that up but
if you have similar audiences and you
want to sort of help each other out
you can quickly grow your account that
way by reaching those new people
alright the legal stuff feel like I
should have a big book and put on some
glasses for this the legal stuff first
of all Instagram requires that you
follow all federal state and local laws
age restrictions all those things you
can't tag anyone in the post it's not
actually part of the contest you also
can't ask people to tag themselves or
their friends in a picture in your post
that they're not actually in that's
because it's very deceiving like you say
hey tagged yourself in our photo and
then their friends get notified then
they're like you're not even in this
picture make sure to include any other
necessary rules to answer people's
questions is there an age restriction we
talked about when it starts and ends do
they have to live in a certain
geographical area how will you contact
the winner if they don't reply within a
certain time do they forfeit their prize
how are they going to get their prize
once they win and finally the one thing
that Instagram requires for your contest
to be legal is you have to use this
language here on the screen in your post
per Instagram rules this promotion is in
no way sponsored administered or
associated with Instagram Inc by
entering entrants confirm that they are
13 plus years of age release Instagram
of responsibility and agree to
instagrams Terms of Use
UUM buried the bots on the post doesn't
have to be at the very top but it's
important that you include it so those
are the basics I did link up to
instagrams rules page in the description
of this video if you really want to get
in and make sure that you're covered
obviously I am NOT a lawyer you are
supposed to research this stuff yourself
but those are the basics so what
Instagram contests are you thinking
about running let me know
in the comments I will also comment with
my biggest fear with Instagram contests
and we can chat down there consider
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