A sure-fire way to turn consumer heads is by offering a travel contest. It doesn’t matter what the prize is, the idea of winning an opportunity to go somewhere fun, interesting, relaxing or downright thrilling is an effective tool for enhancing customer engagement and loyalty. But a travel contest’s effectiveness is largely dependent on your plan and how you execute it. So, let’s explore how to run a brilliant travel contest.
In the world of politics, appealing to your base means advancing policy that’s most likely to make your most unwavering supporters happy. In the case of a travel contest, that means ensuring what’s on offer is attractive to the largest possible number of people. In appealing to your base, you establish the value of the contest prize. The more universal the appeal, the higher the perceived value and the higher the value to you. When everyone wants to win because you’ve chosen your prize intelligently, you create excitement and in that excitement are the seeds of potential growth. Knowing what pushes your market’s buttons is key and while diverse tastes are in play, you know that most people love travel. Travel has an intrinsic value to almost everyone. The trick is in crafting the contest.
You can appeal to your base all you want but if you don’t build a bigger tent by offering something to undecided voters (in your case, potential customers), you’re not going to win, right? As in politics, so in commerce. Running a successful contest should acknowledge the fact that there’s no such thing as “enough customers”. Whether you’re big or small, you always want to invite more people to the party. Appealing to your existing customer base may be as simple as offering them a personalized invitation to participate. People like to feel special, so get out that list and make sure your most loyal customers know first. Maybe there’s a bonus prize for the first 50 entries – who will all be your loyal customers. Let them be the first to know and let them be your contest ambassadors by inviting them to participate in the contest rollout by sharing it on your social media channels. They love your product or service, so for them, this is part of the fun. They’re your best brand ambassadors, by far.
The KISS rule is the way to go here. Make sure that the mechanisms for entering your contest are simple and fun. Add a feature like asking entrants to include a photo of themselves on their favorite vacation of all time, or to write (in 100 words or less) why they love to travel. Features like this should include entrant buy-in for the use of their photo or statement. And BAM. You’ve got great content to build as big a tent as possible, reaching into the far corners of your existing market and strengthening bonds with loyal clientele. How cool is that? Need a hand with your brilliant travel contest? Contact us.
