Host A Group Giveaway To Grow Your Email List With Downloadable Checklist
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You’ve probably tried out many strategies to help with the growth of your site and your email list. Marketing your page on Facebook, snapping pics for Instagram, even giving away freebies.
While you may see some growth with those strategies, they won’t swamp you with loads of new subscribers quickly.
But there’s one thing you can do to help you grow that list almost overnight!
Have you ever considered running a group giveaway?
It’s a sure-fire strategy to help with your email list’s growth, and it works quickly.
Hosting a group giveaway is a guaranteed way to multiply the number of subscribers on your list in a relatively short time frame. This option will take the most time and resources to organize, but it will also show you the most results.
There’s a lot to take into consideration, so I’m going to break it down for you. I want to make sure you know what you’re getting yourself into and just why it’s still worth it. If you decide to try your hand at a group giveaway, I’m almost certain that your list will explode.
The more eyes on your promotions means more money in your pocket. That’s the name of the game. You’ll have plenty of opportunities to sell when you grow and nurture your email list.
A successful group giveaway is something anyone can pull off with some planning, organization and the right tools. If you’re willing to invest the time and hard work it’ll take, you’ll enjoy both short and long-term returns. After all, you’ll be creating the chance to sell your products and services to a new audience on the spot.
What’s In It For You?
Imagine your email subscriber list blowing up with new subscribers overnight. That could become a reality if you plan, organize and promote this group giveaway correctly.
You’re bound to get new people signing up to be a part of your list.
The key is targeting your ideal audience with a well-thought-out group of prizes or freebies will earn you fans immediately.
Aim to focus on grabbing the attention of those people who are interested in what you’re offering. They are the perfect leads to have on your list. And you can make that happen with a bit of work.
By using a general prize that everyone wants, like a gift card, you aren’t doing yourself any favors. You will end up with subscribers, sure, but they won’t be interested in you or your offers.
Instead, offer something that leads into other products you offer, so it helps to warm them up and ready them for further sales down the track.
It ensures they are actually interested in what you have to offer.
First The Boring Part: Laws and Regulations
Before we discuss the logistics of running a group giveaway, it’s important you check the laws for the local area where you live. This post will not give you legal advice.
This post will merely give you some ideas for hosting a group giveaway or competition. It’s up to you to ensure it meets the laws and regulations where you and your target audience reside.
There is legislation you will have to consider for every area. For example, in the EU the GDPR has come into effect and this can affect the way you run your giveaway. You need to ensure that everyone who signs up consents to be added to each list separately and manually, boxes can’t be automatically ticked.
Most software that helps you run giveaways will be GDPR-compliant. But, it pays to check. Especially if you are the host.
In many regions, it is illegal to run a lottery-type giveaway and in these cases, you can often work around it by creating a game of skill, where entrants have to complete a task. Then you choose the winner based on their merits you have outlined in the terms and conditions of your giveaway.
Now that the legal stuff is out of the way, let’s get down to the fun part: growing your list.
Choosing Your Prizes
As I mentioned earlier, to get the most out of your giveaway you want to target your ideal audience. The best way to do this is to come up with a relevant prize. Not something that everyone wants to win. You want to focus on your ideal customer.
By offering them something they want that relates to the products or services you provide. For example, if you are a weightless coach you could give away a healthy eating and exercise plan tailor-made for the winner. Or an e-course on losing weight.
You also want to select prize donors to join the group giveaway who are also authorities in their niche which should relate to yours somehow too.
Their offer must also somehow relate to your niche, or you will end up with a bunch of subscribers who aren’t really interested in what you offer.
You want qualified leads, not just anyone on your mailing list. So, choose people who are well known in your area of expertise to offer products for the give-away. Target those who have established their presence and shown they are good at marketing. They will be more likely to help promote the event. They will also be more likely to offer a value-packed prize for the winner/s or new subscribers.
Once you’ve got a group of people together and know what the prizes will be. Decide on how many winners there will be and who wins what. Also, how you will choose the winner.
Will it be the person who refers the most friends? Or someone who shares the most or submits the best photo or caption? Or is everyone who signs up going to get a freebie?
It’s up to you to figure out how you will decide on the winner and how many there will be. Be sure that even your giveaway prize is value packed to help grow your reputation as a trusted advisor.
If you offer a freebie to everyone who signs up to the group mailing list, you then direct them to a landing page. This is where they can download the freebies being given away. Or you can offer the option to sign up to those lists that interest them only, that requires subscription forms for all the prize donors, it may even call for separate landing pages. There are some decisions you’ll need to make about how best to run this based on your needs.
There are a few ways you can choose to organize it. If everyone gets a freebie you will likely get more people to sign up and take part. If there is only one winner, the prize will often be more valuable, so you will still attract new subscribers who are interested in the prizes on offer. Both methods are beneficial when it comes to list building.
Finding People to Join Your Group Giveaway Event
Approach those people you feel are established enough that they have an audience to promote the event to and also a product they can donate. If they don’t have one themselves, you could offer up a gift voucher for a course supplied by someone else or some other relevant product.
Expect to get a few nos when you approach people to join in. To maximize the chances of people saying yes, tell them what they will get out of the arrangement first and foremost. And let them know what work you will do to make it easier for them.
Some benefits to remind them of are:
- They’ll grow their email list too.
The ultimate goal of the giveaway is for everyone involved to grow their list, so make sure you highlight this point. By choosing those in a similar niche to yours, you will target the right audience for everyone.
- Their products and services will also be promoted.
The event will get eyes on their products and services and expose them to an audience they may not otherwise have the chance to be promoted in front of. Even those people who don’t subscribe to their list will have learned about their brand, which is a good thing.
Exposing the audience to their brand brings them into the awareness phase of the funnel.
- Meeting other authorities within their niche.
Such a giveaway event allows for people to network with other people. They may not otherwise get a chance to meet. This can be valuable in the long run as you meet other business owners in the same niche as you. You may even establish friendships, and as they say, it’s not what you know but who you know.
- It’s an overall huge marketing and sales opportunity with little work on their part.
You may not decide to offer upsells in your event. But it still gives participants the opportunity to put their products and services out there, in front of a new audience. Everyone involved will have the same opportunity to monetize. Everyone can choose how to best use the event to their benefit.
Offering Creative Elements and Organizing the Big Event
As well as highlighting the benefits when you approach potential participants. It’s a good idea to tell them what other things you will do that will make their life easier. Aside from organizing the logistics of the giveaway and setting up the software.
You may choose to run the event using particular software that you can set up too. You will also want to have a swipe file of creatives and other information for attendees to have handy.
Some things you may arrange include:
- A Swipe File packed full of creative elements to use in blog posts and well-designed graphics for use on social media in all appropriate sizes for various platforms (Pinterest, Facebook and Twitter images, etc.). Provide copy for them to use in posts, think about different tweets, Facebook updates, etc. Make the copy you provide best suits the platform being targeted.
- Landing page that is well-designed and optimized for conversions, including the one where you will host the giveaway itself.
- A timeline of events clearly stating the marketing events in calendar format, so participants can merge with their own via Google Calendar.
- Copy for email sequences that participants can send to their list in case they don’t have the time to create it for themselves. This will save time, energy and convince many marketing partners to join you.
- Create a welcome pack with all the relevant information and links to the swipe file. This makes it easier for participants and encourages them to take part. By taking on most of the responsibility yourself, they are more likely to say “yes.”
As I mentioned earlier, it is important to target respected authorities in their niche, which must relate back to your niche.
Deciding Who to Approach
You could create a spreadsheet with names of candidates and list things like their social followers, their domain authority (DA), keywords they rank for, number of email subscribers (if you can find this out.)
Then decide who you will ask based on those things. You could ask only people that have a certain number of subscribers to join. Or focus on high ranking sites with a good domain authority score.
No matter how much effort you put in, you will still get people who say “no.” Maybe they don’t have an offering for the giveaway, or maybe they are just too busy. Whatever the case, don’t take it personally.
Follow Up With the Prize Donors
When you do have some participants, don’t forget to follow up with them. Stay in touch with them and show your appreciation for them joining in the event.
After you send the welcome pack, email all participants to ensure they received them.
Also, contact them in advance to remind them of special days you have planned, such as when they should post about the event on their blog. Or when it’s time to start promoting on social media platforms.
Remind them a week and then a day or so in advance to make sure they don’t forget important dates.
Ensure you check in with them and answer their questions. These tasks are something you could get a virtual assistant to help you handle if you don’t have the time to do it all yourself.
Group Giveaway Event Checklist & Quick Guide
Prizes and how they'll be delivered.
You’ll need systems and tools for delivery of prizes to your new subscribers.
First, decide how they will be delivered. Participants can choose what they want to donate as a prize.
You can then pool all the prizes to give everyone who signs up, or just one winner.
If you are giving the freebie to everyone, it's likely they will be lower in value like an eBook or checklist. If you have fewer winners like one or just a few, you can offer more exclusive items like courses or coaching. It’s worth thinking about the value of the prize and the number of winners. People are less likely to want to give potentially hundreds of people access to one of their high-ticket courses, but they may allow one person to win a place in one of their higher end courses. Similarly, they may have a simple eBook they are happy to give away to a number of new subscribers. You need to choose the way you are going to run it. Will you focus on many low ticket items or a few big ticket items?
You will probably get more sign-ups with a guaranteed freebie for everyone, but maybe more qualified leads with one main well targeted prize.
Well-Optimized landing page for sign-ups.
A simple form where entrants add their email address might do. Or, you might go for something more involved. You can ask participants to share on social media or follow the people who donated prizes, including you. Each action you ask them to do gets a new entry into the main prize draw. So the more they share and like etc the more chances they have to win. At least in theory.
It depends on how you will choose the winner. You could award it to the person who refers the most friends, but it might be wiser to ask some questions and award the prize to the answers you like best. This gets around the lotto laws present in some areas by adding the skill component to the “game.”
SEO and advertising is important.
Using proper SEO techniques are important. Always. So that people can find the giveaway event in this case. Advertising and promoting the event on social media will help too. A well focused ad campaign can help a lot.
Sending emails to those on existing lists will help get the word out. Plan your promotional activities. Remind others when to share what.
Plan and design the creatives and copy for different platforms. Give these to everyone involved in the event to share on their profiles.
This should have been done early on. So, you don’t need to rush it last minute.
A reliable and scalable web host.
A reliable server to host the landing pages is essential. You could end up with a massive influx of visitors that your usual hosting may not be equipped to handle, so make sure you check it out first. If you are with ServerWise, you shouldn’t need to worry about this, as our platform is built to scale.
But feel free to let us know you have an unusual event planned. And that it could bring in added traffic. We can take care of you.
The page where the magic happens.
There may need to be a hidden landing page where people who sign up can choose and download their freebies. This only applies if you are giving everyone the same freebies. And if you won’t be sending the files to them by email, which could be the easier option for you to set up.
In the case of one winner, you’ll just need to send the winner their prizes or instructions on claiming them.
A Thank You landing page.
A confirmation landing page is prime real estate. Don’t let it go to waste. Whatever you do, make sure you customize it with your branding. Don’t let it display the default settings set by the provider.
You could use it for small upsells and offer products at a heavily discounted rate. This will only work if the product is closely related to the prize or offers.
Another option is to embed a welcome video and record a video to welcome them onto your email list. This helps to build trust and introduces your brand to them in a personalized way.
Email marketing platform.
You will need a reliable service to provide email marketing through, so you can follow up with your newly grown list.
You’ll need a branded email address too. So you can maintain contact with the other business owners. And it’s required to set up email marketing.
Strong email sequence ready to go.
Write up the emails to send as part of the follow-up sequence.
Be prepared in advance and write a sequence of follow-up emails introducing yourself to the new subscribers. Or if you have already shown them videos expand on the initial introduction.
Work on building a good relationship.
Talk about things they can relate to, so they feel like you really understand them. They’ll be more likely to “get,” you and take in your message.
Don’t waste this great opportunity now you have a bunch of new subscribers. Eventually use it to promote other services and products of yours or your affiliates.
Remember though your emails should be useful and value-packed, not just hard sell tactics. They won’t work effectively on a cold list.
Give them some advice or educational emails, let them get to know you. Try sending video emails as a way of personalizing the message even further.
The 80/20 rule is good to go by. Send 80% educational and entertaining content that is personalized by you. The other 20% or less can include promotional content.
Do you have a network you can tap?
A network of friends and colleagues you can approach to donate prizes will make this event much easier to organize. It can still happen if you don’t know anyone in your niche, but it will make it a little harder to get people to agree to join in.
Group Giveaway Event Checklist
What happens after the event?
After all that you will have a new list of subscribers. They are yours to nurture and warm up, so they are ready when you decide to pitch them an offer.
And, the event will have helped to cement you as an authority in your specialized area. Especially after giving away a prize that is helpful to the winner (or new subscriber,) and you’ve helped them solve a real problem. They’ll be more likely to trust what you have to say.
A group giveaway event requires some thought and organization. But the resulting list of new subscribers will be a valuable asset you’ll own into the future. The return on investment should make it worthwhile.
It will be an ongoing job to nurture the list you have just created. That job is worthwhile and will result in more sales opportunities for you.
It’s All About Relationship Building With Your New Subscribers
Finally, you’ll need to build a relationship with your new readers. Do this by creating meaningful, useful emails for them to consume.
Enjoy the process, and it won’t feel like work at all. You’re just getting to know your audience. Always be coming from a helpful place. Ask yourself how what you are sharing helps them or makes their life better or easier.
Assist them with their various problems. Which you can learn about through your research and by just asking.
In this way, you will position yourself as a trusted source of information. People will grow to know, like, and trust you. Then they will be more willing to consider buying when you do offer them one of your products or an affiliate offer later on.
Eventually, some of them may become high paying clients. It’s up to you to show them how you can make their lives better. You know they need help in some area of their life, show them what you can do for them that will change their lives. Then they’ll be likely to consider buying from you. Even a small percentage of buyers who make it through your funnel is great for your business. And ultimately the more buyers you have the more you will get, as they spread the word.
Everyone who is selling something could use a strong info-product to compliment their brand and boost engagement. Whether you charge for it upfront or not is irrelevant. I’ve put together my 18 step cheat sheet for creating awesome products. Keep Learning >
One of the biggest assets you’ll ever create is your mailing list. You build trust and authority by sending highly relevant info that your subscribers can act on. Growing your subscribers doesn’t have to be difficult with these seven methods you can start right now. Keep Learning >