7 Creative Facebook Giveaway Ideas for 2023 [+ Examples]

36% of the unshortened global population uses Facebook monthly. And while we’re unrepealable each of those 2.91 billion people has their own unique personality and specific interests (pineapple on pizza? Crocs in regular or sport mode?), we’re moreover sure that 100% of them have one thing in common: they love self-ruling stuff.

Hosting a Facebook races or giveaway is an spanking-new (and cheap) strategy for promoting your business—plus, it’s a nice way to requite when to your brand’s loyal followers. That said, there are moreover a lot of ways—from obnoxious to outright illegal—that Facebook contests should not be run.

Keep reading for a step-by-step guide on how to plan and execute a Facebook races that’ll thrill both your regulars and your analytics.

What is a Facebook contest?

A Facebook races is a races that involves Facebook users inward to win goods, services or other things of value (for example, clout) provided by the races organizer. Think of it like a physical yank you’d enter at a supermarket, but instead of participating by writing your name and contact info on a slip of paper, you’re inward electronically, by liking a post or writing a comment.

What is a Facebook giveaway?

A Facebook giveaway is a popular subcategory of Facebook contests — in fact, most of the contests you’ll see on the platform can be classified as a giveaway.

Giveaways unchangingly involve the gifting of something of monetary value to the races winner. For example, a photographer might hold a races and souvenir the winner a self-ruling photoshoot. Or a candle trademark might requite yonder a set of their new Fall scents (pumpkin spice, obviously).

But sometimes, you’ll see Facebook contests that aren’t technically giving anything away—for instance, an unprepossessing shelter might hold a “cute dog” races and simply share a photo of the winner instead of having an very prize of monetary value. In most cases, though, the words “contest” and “giveaway” are interchangeable.

How to plan and run a Facebook contest

Running a Facebook races is easy enough, but there’s a few things to know surpassing you embark on your first giveaway — both for the success of your Facebook marketing strategy and to make sure you’re not breaking any of the platform’s rules.

Step 1: Know your goals

Why are you running a Facebook races in the first place? It’s to modernize your social media game, of course—but how?

Ensure you know what your goal is. Building trademark awareness, boosting engagement, getting likes, marketing a new product, gaining followers and learning increasingly well-nigh your followers are all worldwide goals. When planning your contest, make sure to alimony those goals in mind.

If you’re not sure where to start, Hootsuite has a whole online training session on best practices for running social media contests — trammels it out.

Step 2: Define your Facebook races rules

You’ll want to set your own rules (for example, no one who works for your visitor can win — bummer) for your Facebook contest, but you moreover need to be mindful of the social media platform’s official rules when it comes to giveaways.

Facebook’s most recent updated races rules unravel lanugo into three major parts.

You are responsible for running the races legally. In other words, Facebook isn’t going to help you stave breaking state, provincial or federal laws by, say, unwittingly running a lottery instead of a contest.

Hint: a lottery includes any races where participants are required to spend money to play, i.e., buy a product.

You are responsible for obtaining from participants “a well-constructed release of Facebook” and an acknowledgement that Facebook has nothing to do with the contest. One tried-and-true place to house all these regulations, notifications, and consents is a giveaway landing page.

Requiring people to use their personal timelines or friend connections to participate is not allowed. Here’s where the old rules fall by the wayside. Asking people to tag a friend or share a Facebook post on their timeline used to be a standard races requirement. No more!

Here’s the direct word from Meta itself:

“Promotions may be administered on Pages, Groups, Events, or within apps on Facebook. Personal Timelines and friend connections must not be used to supervise promotions (ex: “share on your Timeline to enter” or “share on your friend’s Timeline to get spare entries,” and “tag your friends in this post to enter” are not permitted).”

That said, the benefits of these latest changes outweigh the inconveniences.

Those practices were unquestionably pretty worrying to most people. Decreasing the overall pollution on Facebook ways a largest wits for users, which ways people will protract to use the platform (and enter your contests).

So, to recap what’s unliable versus what‘s not:

Acceptable Facebook races entry requirements:

• Like this post
• Comment on this post
• Like comments on this post (i.e., vote by liking)
• Post on this Page’s timeline
• Message this Page

Practises that are not unliable (and might result in your races post stuff flagged or deleted):

• Share this post on your timeline
• Tag your friends
• Share this post on your friends’ timeline

One grey zone is asking people to like your Facebook Merchantry Page. Technically, this isn’t versus the rules, but it’s not recommended considering there’s no easy way to track the folks who have washed-up so.

That said, you can encourage people to like your Page and enter for a endangerment to win via a less suspect method.

Step 3: Pick a prize

Pick a prize that aligns with your brand, and is something your followers are going to get excited about. For example, giving yonder a product from a new launch is a unconfined way to promote the launch (and the non-winners might just buy the product anyway).

Also, take a moment to think logistically well-nigh your prize and how you’re going to unhook it to the winner—for instance, an ice surf merchantry is largest off mailing a branded t-shirt than ice cream.

Step 4: Create your assets

All the details of your races can be communicated via plain text, sure. But that’s not very engaging, and people aren’t going to enter if they don’t plane notice that you’re holding a giveaway. Whether or not you’re a graphic diamond pro, there are plenty of apps out there that make photo editing (and subtracting things like text, stickers and graphics) super easy.

Step 5: Promote your races in advance

Let your fans know that you’re having a races by sharing it in advance. You can create hype by sharing info well-nigh your prize (or, if you have multiple prizes, you can share one per day leading up to your races launch).

Use a scheduling tool—like Hootsuite’s calendar, for example—to plan out the posts and make sure you’re posting at the weightier time of day.

Use Hootsuite for self-ruling for 30 days

If you’ve held contests in the past and the winners have shared photos of themselves with the prizes, consider sharing those photos to promote your next contest—just make sure you ask for permission.

Step 6: Post your contest

And, liftoff! Publish your races on Facebook and watch those entries inflowing in. Make sure to moderate the races post and write any questions or ravages that might yield up.

Psst: you don’t have to stick to just Facebook—you can run the same (or a similar) races on Twitter and/or Instagram and/or Youtube, too.

Step 7: Protract to share your races leading up to the deadline

Here’s where that scheduling tool comes in handy again. To make sure your races doesn’t get veiled in engagement announcements or minion memes (or whatever else is bogging lanugo your followers’ feeds) by sharing it often.

As you tideway the races deadline, make sure you communicate to your followers that time is running out. A warm-up until the entry deadline is a unconfined motivator for lazy entrants—get it surpassing it’s gone!

Step 8: Pick the winners

Are there any rules for picking winners of Facebook contests? Technically, no. There’s nothing stopping you from choosing the person with the coolest name or your friend’s mom to win —except, obviously, your ethics.

Picking a winner totally randomly is the weightier way to go. There’s plenty of self-ruling apps and websites that you can visit to pick a random winner:

• Comment picker will pick a random scuttlebutt from your post (so, it’s a good one to use if folks enter by commenting).
• Namepicker and Osortoo moreover pick a name from the scuttlebutt section.
• Woobox can pick comments or “likers.”

Step 9: Notify the winners and tropical the contest

Contact your races winner to let them know they’ve won (tip: try and sound as human as possible in your message, so the winner doesn’t think it’s fake!) and “close” the contest. In other words, edit all of your races posts and add a line stating that the races is closed. This lets latecomers know that the races is over (and makes sure you’re not getting spammed with comments weeks without the winner has been picked).

Source: Facebook

Step 10: Share the winners (with their permission)

This is a bonus step. Once you’ve picked your winner, you can publicly share their username (as long as you’ve laid out that possibility in the races rules). Or plane their photo, with permission. Make sure you get the consent of the winner surpassing doing this.

Source: Facebook

Sharing who won isn’t mandatory, but it does help with your brand’s transparency. Proving you did pick a winner at all ensures that the concert is legit, and you’re not just doing it for the likes or comments.

4 Facebook races ideas

1. Interreact with an influencer (or celebrity)

Working with influencers, KOLs or other influential people (like celebrities, if you have that kind of wangle and budget) is an superstitious way to promote your contest. You’re automatically increasing the reach of your races by well-flavored to both your followers and your collaborator’s followers.

Kaytee’s recent (if weird) collab with Rainn Wilson is a good example of that.

When collaborating with an influencer, KOL or idealism for a Facebook contest, remember to:

• Choose a person whose trademark is in a similar industry to yours, or who your regulars can hands relate to.
• Do your research on the person—make sure you’re not associating your trademark with anyone whose beliefs don’t uncurl with yours.
• Read Hootsuite’s best practices for influencer marketing.

2. Make a game of it

Instead of simply asking followers to like or scuttlebutt on a post to enter your contest, consider making the entry process a little increasingly challenging (and, as a result, increasingly fun).

Fashion e-commerce visitor Myntra used a simple video graphic for their giveaway—participants had to guess how many wireless headphones appeared in a video in order to enter.

When making a game out of your races entry, consider this:

• Don’t make inward too hard—the point, without all, is to have lots of entries, not to make your races exclusive. Inward a races shouldn’t take increasingly than a couple minutes, max.
• Make the game related to your trademark or to the product you’re giving away (for example, “Spot the difference” between two photos might be an effective, simple races idea for a photographer).
• Be sure the person who wins unquestionably gets the wordplay correct. The easiest way to do this is to use a random scuttlebutt picker, then find the scuttlebutt and verify the wordplay is right. If it’s not, spin again.

3. Ask your followers for help

You might not think of a Facebook races as a good source of trademark feedback or inspiration, but it veritably can be. Take this post from a San Francisco pizzeria:

Source: Facebook

The visitor is seeking out a new name for a product and taking to Facebook to ask for suggestions. Folks who scuttlebutt with new name ideas are entered to win a $500 souvenir vellum plus one pizza a week for a year (whoa).

This is a unconfined way to get your polity involved in your merchantry and to create a meaningful connection with your followers.

For this kind of contest, make sure you:

• Keep true to your word. If you’re saying that a races entrant is renaming a product, you’ve got to unquestionably pick from the comments. With that in mind…
• Don’t make the races well-nigh something super important. Plane if your followers are a polity of respectful, reasonable and creative geniuses, you don’t want to requite them too much power over your trademark (don’t let them rename your whole company, for example).
• Share the results! In this kind of contest, you should definitely share what the winning suggestion is. Sharing a couple runner-ups is a good way to get increasingly traffic, too—your honorable mentions are likely to want to share that honor on their own feeds.

4. Encourage followers to share with friends

We once went over the fact that “tag a friend to enter” is technically not allowed—that’s due to Meta’s rules for promotions.

(Note: many, many businesses ignore these rules. In fact, it was tough to find examples of contests that didn’t involve tagging friends for this blog post. Still, those are the rules, and not sticking to them puts you—and your social account—at risk.)

However, there’s a sneaky way virtually this, as exemplified in this concert ticket contest:

Source: Facebook

Technically, this radio station didn’t ask folks to tag their friends—the vague language of “let us know who you would bring” ways that hopeful participants could enter by simply commenting something like “my mom.” But people tagged their friends anyway, which put the races on the friends’ radar, as well.

For this kind of contest:

• Make sure you don’t explicitly ask followers to tag their friends.
• Ask them a question that involves naming flipside person—for example, “tell us who you’d share this romantic dinner for 2 with!” or “tell us who you’d convince to come bungee jumping!”

Remember, it’s moreover versus Meta’s giveaway rules to ask followers to share the post on their own or a friends’ timeline in order to enter the contest.

Bonus: 3 Facebook giveaway ideas

1. Requite yonder a product from an industry partner

Even if you’re not a trademark that makes an hands gift-able product, you can still host an superstitious giveaway—you just need to interreact with flipside business. Not only does this midpoint you can pick a prize that your followers truly want, but it moreover creates positive relationships with other folks in your industry.

For example, Modern Cat magazine’s most obvious giveaway prize would be a subscription to their magazine. Instead, this giveaway is a partnership with a cat supplies brand. It’s hosted by the magazine and gives yonder a product that the readers of the magazine will find appealing.

Source: Facebook

When collaborating with flipside trademark for a giveaway, be sure to:

• Partner with a trademark that aligns with your merchantry values, and has a similar audience (Modern Cat wouldn’t partner with a dog supplies brand).
• Make sure the terms of the giveaway are clear, and sort out logistics—will the price be delivered to you to pass forward, or straight to the giveaway winner, for example?
• Consider including the other trademark in the giveaway entry method: a like or scuttlebutt on their Facebook Page can count as a single entry, too, which helps to remoter promote your races and solidify your relationship.

2. Gloat a milestone

You don’t need an occasion to requite a gift, but it’s unchangingly nice to root your Facebook giveaway to something brand-related—for example, hitting a career or social media milestone. Worldwide milestone examples are gaining a unrepealable value of followers or the year-end of founding your business. Professional soccer player Katriina Talaslahti hosted a giveaway to gloat hitting 20 thousand followers.

For this kind of giveaway, make sure you:

• Frame the giveaway as a souvenir to your followers to thank them for your support
• Pick a professional or personal milestone… or both. In the whilom example, Katriina launches the giveaway to gloat hitting 20k followers (professional) and picks a winner on her birthday (personal).
• If you’re triumphal a regular milestone (for example, a merchantry year-end that comes around, well, annually) consider marking your timetable for upcoming years—you can make your giveaway a tradition.

3. Jump on a trending topic or current event

Making your races relate to a timely event helps to communicate urgency. You want people to enter now, while they can, and tying your wayfarers to something that is temporary is an constructive strategy. Good news: this can be a loose tie; it’s all well-nigh how you sell it.

For example, there’s this winery giveaway that’s linked to a football game:

Source: Facebook

And this pet store giveaway that’s linked to “back to school” season.

The winery isn’t really related to the football game, and dogs don’t go to school (or wear backpacks, usually) but both of these brands linked their contests to current events in a creative way.

For this kind of contest, alimony this in mind:

• Choose an event that your followers are likely to superintendency about. For example,the winery whilom chose a sports team that their polity supported, and the pet store chose “back to school” for pet owners who think of their pets as children (so, most of them).
• Plan far unbearable superiority of the event that you’re not scrambling to make assets. Alimony stress levels low by planning weeks surpassing whatever current event you’re aligning your races with (for example, plan your Valentine’s Day giveaway waaay surpassing February 13).

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