Many brands, personalities, and businesses use social media giveaways to help increase their social media following and drive engagement. Some social media managers have the obvious choice of giving away their own products, but what do you do when you don’t sell a physical product? What if you want to give away something unique that your target audience can’t find in your store, or your website, every day? The answer is gift cards.
Gift Cards Can Appeal to Everyone
It doesn’t matter if you run a podcast, provide personal training tips on your blog, sell insurance, or something else; your followers will love winning a gift card through your social media channels. At EJ Gift Cards, people sell gift cards that they have not used or don’t want so that EJ Gift Cards can connect that unused card with a buyer who wants to save on their gift card purchase. This means there are hundreds of options to choose when buying a gift card. Restaurants, online retailers, brick and mortar stores – you’re sure to find something that appeals to your unique audience.
Gift Card Giveaways Are Easy to Operate
Operating a social media account is just one aspect of what you do. It’s nice to have an active social media presence but you can’t allow it to start taking away from the actual business that you do. That’s why a gift card giveaway is perfect. Unlike giving away a large, bulky product that requires expensive shipping, you simply draw a winner and send them their gift card. No complex packaging, no expensive shipping, no worries! Plus, gift cards are a one-size-fits-all product. When you draw a winner you don’t have to worry about what size of shirt they wear, what their gender is, how tall they are, where they live, or any other considerations. A gift card can be used by anyone!
Set Your Goal
The first thing to do before you start your giveaway promotion is to set a goal. What do you want to accomplish with this promotion? It could be as simple as gain 100 new followers. It could be to earn 500 Retweets. Or, maybe your goal is more complicated. Perhaps you want to gain more followers that are women aged 25 to 35. Maybe you want to grow your following in a specific geographic area. Once you have set a goal, you can decide what kind of gift card for your giveaway would work best. Since so many people choose to sell gift cards that they are not going to use online, you are sure to find a gift card that meets your goals for a lower price than the actual face value of the card. Find something from a store, retailer, or restaurant that appeals to the audience you’re trying to reach. The value of the gift card should also reflect how lofty your goal is. For a simple Retweet or Like, the value could be lower than a more ambitious campaign with a goal of looking for people to tag their friends, comment, or do some sort of task that requires more than a simple button click on their end. Put yourself in your follower’s shoes… Would you want this prize and would you do what is being asked to win it? If the answer is, “yes,” then you’re good to go!
Be Creative With Your Copy
You don’t need to be a shakespeare when you write copy for your social media giveaway but you should consider a few things as you begin the promotion. First, be sure to send out ample updates about the contest to ensure all of your followers have a chance to see it and participate. Each update should be unique – if it’s simply copied and pasted from the earlier one then your followers may ignore it as a duplicate post. Even if someone has already entered, they may see value in new content and mention that update to their friends or family.
Second, when writing your copy, try and create a visual in the mind of your reader. For example, if you are giving away a restaurant gift card don’t just say, “Retweet to win this gift card!” Instead, get the reader excited about what the gift card actually brings to them. You could try something like, “A great steak and a wonderful bottle of wine with friends. It’s on us! Retweet to win!” Now your followers are thinking about a positive experience with their friends and some good food.
Those positive thoughts are immediately connected to your giveaway and your brand. Finally, use images with all of your posts. The image should tie in with the words you’ve chosen to solidify that image in your follower’s mind. This doesn’t have to require you to plan a professional photo shoot. Remember, we want our giveaway to be a quick and easy way to drive engagement. Instead, look for one of the many royalty-free image sites across the web. Using our above example, we could look for an image of people at a restaurant having food at a restaurant. It’s a very simple addition that gives your social media posts an extra punch as you look to promote your giveaway.
Send an Email Blast
If you have a website or email list, there may be a substantial number of people that receive email updates from you but do not regularly check your social media updates. Use your email list as a tool to help promote your giveaway. Some of your email subscribers may not have been aware that following your social media accounts would be such a valuable way of connecting. Others may see the email and already know about the contest but also send it along to a friend who they think might be interested in the prize. If someone has subscribed to your email list, then they have indicated that they want to hear from you so use that to your advantage.
Make Entry Easy
This very much depends on the value of the gift card you’re giving away. While it is nice to have social media followers take the time to make a personal video about why they love your brand, most people will not do that. They will simply move on. It’s best to set the barrier to entry low and allow as many people to be able to enter as possible. Remember, we want more people engaging with your social media accounts when all of this is said and done. If you do want people to go above and beyond by creating videos or writing essays, you will have to make the prize value much higher. On websites like EJ Gift Cards and other Gift Card marketplaces, people sell gift cards of all different values and denominations so you can find the right amount for the type of contest you’re running. If you want a high value card to encourage people to put in the extra effort, you will find one that fits your goal.
Make a Big Winner Announcement
Once you have given away the prize, be sure to announce the winner on your social media channels. First, this adds legitimacy to your future giveaways. If your followers see that someone actually won the prize and you are proud to announce it, they will be more excited and will put their trust the next time you post a giveaway on your social media channels.
Secondly, this allows for another point of engagement with your followers. You can tag the winner in your post and include a photo. If you run a local business you could take a picture with the winner when they visit you to get their prize. If your business is online, you could ask to use their profile photo and edit in the logo of the company they won a gift card to.
Some winners might even be so excited they share that post to their own social media profile, helping grow your social media presence even after the contest has ended and you have given away the gift card. If you are running regular giveaways, it may also be a good idea to add a dedicated “winners” page to your website. This could include pictures of all the winners and quick piece of copy driving people to follow you on your social media channels for the next giveaway.
Turbocharge Your Giveaway
We have covered the basics of running a successful giveaway. Here are a few tips to take your giveaway to the next level:
- Use a promotion app. This is especially helpful when you have several social media channels you want to grow engagement on. You have likely seen these online before. Through one form in a blog post your followers complete small “tasks” like visiting your YouTube channel, subscribing to your email list, and following your Instagram account to earn entries.
The more tasks they complete, the more entries they get. If the prize is exciting, people will complete all tasks and you have just grown all of your social media channels with one simple tool. There are a variety of promotion apps online to choose from so find the one that works for your goals and budget. - Partner with influencers in your niche. One of the best ways to promote your social media account is to partner with someone who has a lot of followers who would be interested in your products or services. You will want to reach out to these influencers before you begin running your promotion and see what they would require in order to be involved. Some may want payment while others may want to do a contest exchange where they promote your giveaway in return for you promoting theirs. If you’re using a social promotion app like was mentioned above, then you can also tie their social accounts into the tasks required to earn entries.
- Measure your results throughout. Of course, comparing your results to your goals at the end of the contest is an obvious exercise. However, there are too many people that fail to follow their campaign’s success as it runs. If you are measuring the success throughout the campaign you may be able to identify an area of weakness or strength that can be used to your advantage. For example, if you are seeing that a majority of your traffic is coming from Facebook, it may be wise to invest in some Facebook ads that promote your giveaway.
Start Your Gift Card Giveaway Now
Now that you know how to run an effective gift card giveaway through social media, what are you waiting for? Let’s get going!
The first step is to choose the card you think will appeal to your followers. People sell unwanted gift cards online that they don’t want or won’t use. This means there are hundreds of different gift cards to choose from. Find one that will connect with your brand, and more importantly, your followers.
If you have gift cards sitting around your home that you don’t want – you can sell them to EJ Gift Cards and turn them into cash! There are people looking for gift cards to their favorite stores, restaurants, and ecommerce sites. EJ Gift Cards buys your unwanted gift cards and offers them to people who are looking to buy. Best of all, there’s no waiting around to get the check in the mail! We send money right to your PayPal account so you can start spending right away!
Physical or digital gift cards – EJ Gift Cards buys a wide variety of gift cards from some of the most well-known brands! Want to start selling your unused gift cards now? See the list of accepted gift cards, log in, and then submit your information to get an offer. It’s that simple!
Buying or selling, the choice is obvious. Whether you are growing your social media accounts, buying a gift for a friend or loved one, or just looking to turn your extra gift cards into some cash – EJ Gift Cards is here. Browse our gift card selection and start buying or earning cash today!
