Useful Resources For Running Competitions
Our guide should provide you with some basic information to help you when it comes to running a competition or prize draw. However, there's plenty more to read and digest. For example there are a whole bunch of useful tools that make running promotions easier. You can also use competitions to improve your SEO. In addition Di Coke aka SuperLucky has created a very useful guide for promoters too. Here's a round up of some additional useful links and resources to help you run your competition.
Competitions & SEO
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is a complex topic and one which we're not going to get involved with here. However people much cleverer than us have come up with articles explaining how your contest or competition can be used to build links and improve SEO.
- Running Giveaway Competitions for Links and SEO (SEOMoz)
- How to Create a Contest That Lifts Your Engagement & SEO
- How to Use Social Media Contests and Giveaways to Boost SEO
Random Number Generators & Winner Selection Tools
Picking a winner needs to be fair and transparent so many promoters turn to random number generator services to assist them. A cool thing you can do to add with your contest and add a bit of excitement to proceedings is show the result via a live stream. Just do a few test runs before the main event though so you don't run into any mishaps.
- Google Random Number Generator
- Picker Wheel
- Random.org
- Randomizer
- Random Draws
- Twitrand
- Wheel Of Names
- You To Gift
Legal Stuff
Our advice about running a prize promotion is simply that - advice. However you might want to talk to legal bods who can help you with the nitty gritty details. This is well worth doing if you're considering running a raffle, win a house contest or something that's a little bit unusual.
- Running a Competition (Outlaw)
- Running a Competition FAQ (Outlaw)
- Running Prize Draws (ASA)
Useful Competition Plugins
There are now a wide range of apps and services you can utilise when it comes to running a prize promotion. These simply plugin to your site and make things such as collecting entries and picking winners much easier to manage. A cost is usually involved although the basic Rafflecopter service is free. We've used Gleam but currently use Rafflepress as it integrates with Wordpress a lot easier.
Competition Bloggers & Services
For even more good advice about running competitions then we do suggest dropping into Di Coke's blog at SuperLucky. She is the number one person to talk to about competitions. For professional services including prize fulfillment and management then the likes of Prizeology and Prizeshark may be able to help.
Other Services
If you run a useful service for contests, prize draws and online competitions and we haven't included you then please feel free to get in touch.
