Promotional Tools

Somewhere along the continuum that is man’s great history, at some point in between the world’s first Olympics and the first flea market, a funny thing happened. Somebody had the idea to turn our love of games and contests into a promotional tool, a way of attracting attention for their goods or services, and since then the world of marketing has never been the same.

Today contests and sweepstakes are used to sell everything from magazine subscriptions and airline tickets to gym memberships and software packages. As a consumer, you can hardly open your mailbox or stroll through your local shopping mall without being presented some sort of offer … Enter for your chance to collect $1 million! … Win an all-expenses-paid vacation to Tahiti! … Earn a chance to meet your favorite celebrity! …

The tactic has even found its way to the Internet, where consumer mind share is a hot commodity and incentive-offering is a near necessity in the acquisition of new customers.

Take a glance through the Media Metrix Top 500. Here, nestled among the Web’s most visited properties, you will find sites with gamely sounding names like LuckySurf, iWon, EasyWinning, JackPot, PrizeCrazy, WebStakes, and others—all quite obviously alluding to the fact that some sort of contest or sweepstakes can be found inside. According to a report issued by Jupiter Media Metrix in February of this year, eight of the top 22 most successful Web sites launched in 2000 were sweepstakes sites.

Although these sites and others like them are in fact an evolution of the sweepstakes-as-promotion model, entering into the realm of sweepstakes-as-product instead, their success only validates the use of contests and sweepstakes in online marketing campaigns.

“There’s so much noise being made on the Internet these days that companies are having to offer some sort of incentive to lure visitors to their sites,” says Mike Reilly, president and general manager of SweepstakesOnline. Reilly’s company has been telling consumers where to find valuable sweepstakes, freebies, raffles, lotteries and other games since 1995 through its Web site and newsletter.

Seizing the opportunity, SweepstakesOnline began offering sweepstakes promotion and development services to other companies on the Internet looking for a little marketing jolt. To date, the company’s Sweepstakes Builder unit has conducted sweepstakes promotions for companies such as CBS MarketWatch, Alamo Rent-A-Car, Buy.com, Bacardi Rum, Blockbuster Video, and a long list of others.

“Sweepstakes are appealing to marketers because they can meet just about any objective they might have,” says Reilly. “If you want to launch a new product, sweepstakes can do that. If you want to increase your registrations, get more sales leads, or improve your company’s branding, sweepstakes can accomplish any of those goals as well.”

To wit, when compared to other customer acquisition methods, sweepstakes make for particularly versatile promotions. Perhaps that’s because they adhere to the old adage that you must give something of value in order to get something of value, and therefore they allow for a deeper level of interaction between a merchant and its customers.

“The Web is an entirely new kind of advertising medium,” explains Christopher McCarthy, vice president of marketing and strategic services at IQ Commerce, Inc., a digital marketing service provider that offers end-to-end sweepstakes solutions including all aspects of integration, deployment and fulfillment. “It’s about bringing together the brand experience with the knowledge, tools and techniques of promotional marketing or direct marketing,” he says.

Traditionally, the techniques that allow marketers to promote their brand image—such as TV and radio ads, or online banners—have been unsuccessful in eliciting a direct consumer response, while the techniques that do illicit a direct consumer response—direct mail, for example, or catalogue marketing—have typically failed to promote the company’s brand. Online sweepstakes, according to McCarthy, are a perfect example of the blending of these two visions.

Like most Internet promotions, it’s of critical importance to track and analyze the results of an online sweepstakes, and both IQ Commerce and Sweepstakes Builder allow clients to do just that. IQ actually takes it a step further, enabling clients to peak in on results in real time and make appropriate adjustments on the fly. But the real strength of IQ’s sweepstakes offering, to hear Mr. McCarthy tell it, is what the company does after the participants sign up.

“Follow up is one of the most important aspects of a sweepstakes promotion,” he says. “Too many companies don’t do anything with the e-mails they collect. We’re able to garner much better results by following up with a coupon offer or a brief survey.”

According to research conducted by Michael May, a senior analyst with Jupiter Media Metrix, 53 percent of marketers do nothing with the participants in their promotions who do not immediately become customers, while only 16 percent follow up with at least one or two e-mails. That sort of divide is what keeps most sweepstakes from maximizing their potential.

Regardless, May and other pundits recommend sweepstakes and giveaways above many other online promotions—including coupons, discounts or free shipping—as the most effective method of customer acquisition and prospecting.

With the explosion of sweepstakes around the Web, apparently people are listening.

© Copyright 2001 by Dotfactor.com

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