How to Set Up a Competition to Drive Website Engagement

Website competitions work because people can’t resist free stuff. When someone sees a chance to win something valuable, they’ll give you their email address, follow your social accounts, or share your content with friends. The trick is to make sure your competition helps your business grow instead of just giving away free products to random strangers.

Pick One Goal and Stick to It

Most businesses mess up competitions because they want everything at once. They want more followers AND more email subscribers AND more sales AND more brand awareness. This shotgun approach is rarely a good thing to do. Pick one thing you need right now and build your entire competition around that single goal.

Need email subscribers because your list is tiny? Make email signup the main way to enter. Want more Instagram followers? Force people to follow your account to participate. Launching a new product? Structure everything around that product launch. Your goal determines your prize, your entry method, and how you promote the whole thing.

Simple Beats Complex Every Time

You can ask people to do easy things or hard things. Easy things get more participants. Hard things get better participants. Most successful competitions lean toward being easy because numbers matter more than individual quality in most cases.

Easy competitions ask for email addresses, social follows, or content shares. Hard competitions want photo submissions, detailed reviews, or creative content. The Best Competitions site shows examples from different industries where both approaches have worked, but simple entry methods consistently generate higher participation rates across all business types.

Your Prize Determines Your Participants

Give away an iPhone and you’ll attract everyone on the internet. Give away your actual products and you’ll attract potential customers. Give away a service consultation and you’ll attract serious prospects who might actually buy from you later.

Product bundles work best for most businesses because they introduce people to what you sell. Gift cards are easier but attract bargain hunters who might never buy anything at full price. Experience prizes, such as workshops or consultations, create the strongest connections but appeal to smaller audiences.

The prize value needs to match what you’re asking people to do. An email signup might justify a small product sample. A detailed photo submission with a written review deserves something more substantial.

Keep Entry Rules Dead Simple

The moment your competition becomes confusing, people stop participating. Limit entry requirements to two or three actions maximum, and make the rules so clear that a distracted person scrolling their phone can understand them immediately.

Each requirement should serve your main goal. Here are some ideas:

• Email signup builds your marketing list. 
• Social follows boost your online presence. 
• Website visits expose people to your products and might generate sales before you even pick a winner. 

Don’t add requirements just because you can.

Choose Your Platform Based on Your Audience

Social media competitions spread faster because platforms reward engagement with increased visibility. Website competitions give you more control over participant data, while email competitions work best if you already have a decent subscriber list.

Instagram and Facebook make sharing easy, but limit what information you can collect about participants. On the other hand, dedicated competition platforms cost money but provide better tools for managing entries and picking winners. And pop-ups on your website catch people who are already interested in what you sell.

Promote Your Business the Best You Can

Your existing customers already trust your brand, so they make the perfect starting audience for any competition you launch. These people will jump in without hesitation because they already trust your brand, and they’ll naturally tell their friends about what you’re offering when they see something worth sharing. Email your subscriber list, share posts across social media, and put banners on your website where visitors can’t miss them.

Find businesses that serve similar customers and propose cross-promotion deals where everyone wins. Their audiences discover your competition without you spending money on advertising, and you can help promote their future campaigns in return.

When people share your competition on their social accounts, reward them with bonus entries that turn every participant into someone actively working to bring their friends into your campaign.

Pick Winners Fairly and Follow Up

Nobody likes competitions that feel rigged, so random selection shows everyone they had fair chances to win. Fair processes make people trust your brand enough to enter future competitions. When your competition involves creative submissions rather than simple entries, spell out your judging criteria before anyone starts working on their entries so they know exactly what impresses you.

Announce your winners where everyone can see them because public declarations prove you follow through on what you promise. All those people who entered but didn’t win still cared enough about your brand to spend time participating, and smart businesses recognize this interest by sending thoughtful follow-up messages. 

Thank-you emails that include discount codes or special offers often turn disappointed participants into happy customers who appreciate how professionally you handled everything.