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Giveaways are a fun way to boost engagement on your social platforms and reward your followers for supporting your business - and people have caught on. It seems like everyone is offering giveaways on social media these days and we think it’s great! We LOVE a good giveaway. But did you know there is a right and a wrong way of hosting one for your business? It seems like a pretty straight forward process, but we have some tips and tricks for hosting a successful giveaway - and one that doesn’t get flagged on your social channels. Read on as we run through the best way of hosting social media giveaways to promote your business. 

Tip 1: Know Your Objectives

Our biggest tip is to understand the reason behind your giveaway. This can help establish your game plan for how the giveaway will work, and will also change how you decide to promote your giveaway. Common objectives driving giveaways include:

• Encouraging Post Engagement
• Increasing Brand Awareness
• Creating An Email List 
• Product Promotion

Understanding what you want to achieve through a giveaway not only saves you time in the long run, but can also make your marketing efforts a little easier too. 

A key component of social media giveaways are, well, the social media platforms you choose to host them on. Starting with platforms where you’ve already established your business are a great place to start, but depending on the intentions behind your giveaway, you might need to consider where your audience will be most likely to engage with your efforts. 



Instagram is great for sharing videos and pictures. If you’re hoping to unveil a new product line with your giveaway, then consider using this platform to highlight these products. 

Facebook is ideal for building a sense of community. If your engagement levels are low and you’re hoping to generate more interactions with the brand as a whole, then this platform may be the best choice. 

It’s important to know where your audiences are going to be most active and which platforms will benefit you the most to use during your giveaway. 

Speaking of benefits, when you’re conducting a giveaway, most people are initially coming for the prize, so it’s important to pick a good one! Consider connecting the prize to your current business offerings. Whether it’s a product or a service, basing the prize around what you do best is a great way of giving the winner a taste of what you have to offer and can generate some positive word of mouth. 

If your brand is on the newer side, partnering with another business for your giveaway can create more buzz and excitement for both of you. We are all for supporting a fellow business owner. You can also think about items that aren’t connected to your business, but are popular and will draw people in. Lately, we’ve found that restaurant gift cards, event tickets, and YETI cups do really well. Combining something like that with your business offering can set you up for success. In the end, everyone loves free stuff, but it’s about strategizing about what will help you meet your goals!

Once you’ve worked through the first three tips, it’s time to really consider your game plan for the giveaway. You know why this giveaway is important for your business, where your audience is going to be actively participating in the contest, and have settled on a prize. So now it’s time to outline the remaining details.

Things like:

• Timeline For Entry and Prize Allotment 
• How The Giveaway Will Be Promoted
• Entry Submission Options
• Additional Contest Rules

Like we said, hosting a social media giveaway can be pretty straightforward and a lot of fun! But it’s also important to make sure you and your followers are protected during your giveaway.

Here are a things to keep in mind:

• Include in your giveaway description which account(s) would contact the winner. A lot of scam accounts pop up during giveaways, and will message your followers for credit card information or personal details.
• Add a disclaimer that the giveaway is not affiliated with Facebook or Instagram in any way.
• Avoid boosting giveaway posts or putting ad dollars behind them. They can get flagged by Meta and the giveaway will be taken down. 

Once you’ve worked through these remaining details, you should be more than ready to launch a successful social media giveaway for your business! Before you move on though, let’s quickly discuss some things you should not do when planning a social media giveaway.

This section is pretty simple but let's review it together anyway! Most of the don’ts about social media giveaways are the complete opposite to the tips above.

So if you’re considering:

• Not Listing Prizes Or Entry Methods
• Hosting A Giveaway With Zero Planning
• Changing Entry Methods Halfway Through
• Not Properly Assessing Your Media Platforms
• Hosting On Platforms Your Audiences Don’t Use



Don’t do it! You’d only be making more work for yourself by skipping the tips listed above and risk missing out on valuable opportunities to build stronger relationships with your followers.