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A community of consumers known as Sweepers enter prize promotions on a daily basis as a hobby, and some even consider it their profession. Many organizations consider them as off-target consumers and thus, a nuisance. As social media expands, sweepstakes & contest enthusiasts are actually uniquely positioned to help expand engagement. Facebook defines engagement as anyone who has clicked anywhere on your post. This includes liking, commenting, sharing, viewing a video or photo or any other social interactions that create what Facebook considers your fan base. Since the objective of a sweepstakes is to crate awareness, and a contest extends that to engaging consumers with a mentally challenging activity, embracing these busy bees is to your advantage.
Who Are These Enthusiastic Enterers
Sweeper demographics documented in a white paper by HelloWorld, formerly ePrize, in 2010 indicated, “they are consumers who buy products and services… The majority of visitors (to the top two internet blog sites) are college educated and almost 20% earn over $100,000 per year.” A key number identified in the research is that 59% are in the 18 to 49 age category, coincidently the very same top age groups that use social networking sites. Organizations like the Travel Channel and HGTV embrace the entire universe of potential consumers as their ultimate goal is to encourage daily visits to promote site advertisers and other partnerships. They do limit their prospective field with the prerequisite that you need to subscribe to cable TV to submit an entry.
The Skinny On Contest & Sweeper Blogs
I took a journey into the psyche of a Sweeper by entering the world of free sweepstakes information sites. Most are set-up to service the interest and needs of the professional Sweeper with the latest prize promotions and instant win sweepstakes posted by date, prize categorize and cash sweepstakes.
One site that has the sweepstakes developer in mind is Sweepstakes Advantage. They have a program for sweepstakes developers where you can buy from 600 to 1,000 unique clicks, or a monthly contract program, from an elaborate system that includes Instagram, Facebook, Newsletter, and Blog traffic.
They get the concept of engagement and have created a win/win system to attract clients that want to work with their platform to increase exposure, while offering more content for their fan base to perhaps share and comment on.
Another forward thinking site is Online Sweepstakes. They have an option on their contact page for Advertising/Partnership inquiries.
A site called Sweepstakes Today was interesting because there is a service for Sweepers to help them enter frequently and with great speed using enhanced options. The site required user name & password set-up. I did not see any services that enhance a sweepstakes producer’s engagement.
Engage In A Three Way Tryst
Lesson learned from my foray is that it would behoove us all to add a social media engagement option within our next prize promotion. Giving entrants the ability to gain additional entries through social sharing, likes, and viewing content greatly extends the number of people you can reach, while boosting traffic to your site or Facebook page. Reaching consumers through Sweeper sites is getting better as they embrace the concept of increased engagement. Consider giving entrants the option to share their experience socially to increase your brand exposure exponentially.
