Competitions

Humans are built with a competitive mind. We are jealous of people who are doing better than us. We want to win. Giving the opportunity to compete in simple things is a way to engage with customers. Being part of a competition will stay in the customers mind.

When your brand runs a competition your audience try to be a part of it. And they wait for the results. They check back in with you every once in a while, to get an update on the results. What did we achieve here? We achieved Brand Recall.

If you are a restaurant you can have food photography contest, Guess as many ingredients as possible contest. Or even better, an eating competition. If you are a musical instrument brand you can have a performance music competition. If you are fitness brand you can have fitness test contest on social media. Challenges.

In all of these cases your participants become a marketing engine for you on their social media. You force them to create user generated content, which is whole new tactic by itself. We will talk about that in another episode.

Now let us look at some examples. Mahindra thar. The automobile giants conducts thar fest every year. Part of the fest is an Offroad competition. Crazy offroaders from all parts of the country travel 1000’s of kilometres with their custom built vehicle to participate. And their fan following awaits the results. Even I am part of an offroad club and I have travelled with my club to participate in these events. I haven’t raced myself but, being part of it was exhilarating. The point is, as a result of these competitions, Mahindra is branded as a bad-ass sturdy automobile that can cross any obstacles. The crazy mods on these vehicles makes regular customers wanna buy more accessories for their thar boosting another segment sales for them.

Another example is Redbull. Redbull is a marketing machine. They run competitions all over the world on all different segments. If its crazy Redbull funds it. Their brand name resonates with energy. It’s a drink with a lot of caffeine in it. But they never talk about their product. They just associate themselves with energy. I personally don’t think there is any secret sauce in their drink. But the secret sauce is in their marketing. They are one of the best marketing companies in the world.

You want more examples. Lets go for it. I will educate. That is my purpose in life. Let me think. Yes. The beauty product brand Dove. I get chills when I think about their contest. Real beauty should be shared. They ran a fill in the blanks contest with photos. Participants were supposed to share two things that makes their friend beautiful with a photo attached and share it on social media. And the grand prize, not TV’s or Ipads or product coupons. Winners will become part of their Instore branding. The result, they get real genuine beauties to represent their brand and associated themselves with real beauty sharing. Spot-On right. They hit the branding bulls-eye.

While the first two examples are pricey and needs sizable budgets, the third one doesn’t. You just have think creative. Or hire someone who can be creative.