Makeover Contest dazzles Facebook fans at Her Kansas City Magazine
Looking for a contest with multiple sponsors from the salon and beauty industry? Here's a great "makeover" contest that should go in the tool-box (reprinted from SecondStreeMedia's resource center). With seven sponsor, nearly 1000 players and 400 new fans, the alternative newsweekly scored a home-run.
Background:
The Pitch is a Kansas City, Missouri based alternative weekly that covers all things happening in and around the city – from upcoming concerts to the newest barbeque joints to try. With a decade of experience running online contests, The Pitch is no stranger to the world of online promotions.
Challenge:
The Pitch recently launched a new magazine, Her Kansas City, a local magazine devoted to women’s interests. Their team needed to grow awareness in their target market for Her Kansas City and increase loyal readers for The Pitch, plus build strong relationships with advertisers for both publications.
Solution:
The team at The Pitch decided to run a “Make Me Over” contest to build their subscriber base. They partnered with eight local salons that each gave a makeover to one contestant. Then, they secured seven sponsors, ranging from a fitness program membership to a personal stylist to a lingerie boutique. By promoting the contest on their website, in print – both with The Pitch & Her Kansas City – through email marketing and social networking, the magazine was able to drive nearly 1,000 players to the contest. At the right, you can see a print ad, with exposure for the sponsors, they ran to announce the winner. Sponsors’ logos were also used in online promotion of the contest.
Results:
After a month and a half long voting period, the contest generated more than 10,000 votes and had 937 players. Throughout the duration of the contest, Her Kansas City gained 400 fans on their Facebook Page.
Why the Make Me Over contest was successful:
- The magazine used integrated promotions to grow awareness for the contest.
- Daily voting enticed players to return often to the contest, which drove over 10,000 votes and an impressive amount of page views.
- Because contestants won by acquiring the most votes, this encouraged social sharing, resulting in more players.
Congratulations to both Pitch and Second Street for another great contest idea.
The author, Alisa Cromer is publisher of a variety of online media, including LocalMediaInsider and MediaExecsTech, developed while on a fellowship with the Reynolds Journalism Institute and which has evolved into a leading marketing company for media technology start-ups. In 2017 she founded Worldstir.com, an online magazine, to showcases perspectives from around the world on new topic each month, translated from and to the top five languages in the world.
