Interactive promotions are a key tactic for capturing the attention of your audience and social media lead generation. But how can you leverage them effectively? Better yet, which is the best platform for creating, launching, and managing these campaigns? We’ll cover all this and more, diving into the importance of interactivity, the role of social media in lead generation, and what you should be looking for as a go-to platform for running lead-generation promotions.

Learn how the town of Leavenworth has been running successful lead generation campaigns using interactive promotions in this case study.

Why Interactive Promotions Matter for Social Media Lead Generation

Interactive promotions are a far cry from traditional ads or static content. These campaigns encourage your audience to engage with your brand in a dynamic way, offering an experience rather than just a message, they draw people in by offering entertainment, rewards, or the thrill of competition. As users interact with the promotion, they’re more likely to remember your brand, which increases brand awareness and customer engagement.

Having said this, why are interactive promotions so effective for social media lead generation? Here are a few reasons:

• Engagement is Key. Interactive content demands participation, which means your audience is more likely to engage with it. This heightened level of involvement not only makes your promotion more memorable but also gives you a perfect opportunity to collect contact information, such as names and emails.
• Data Collection Made Fun. People are much more willing to provide personal data when they feel like they’re getting something in return. Whether it’s entering a contest for a prize or completing a quiz for personalized results, users are more inclined to share their information in exchange for a rewarding experience.
• Social Sharing Multiplies Results. Interactive promotions are inherently shareable. When someone takes part in an engaging quiz or exciting contest, they often share the experience with friends, broadening your campaign’s reach exponentially.
• Personalized Experience. Interactive content, like quizzes or personalized surveys, allows brands to create a custom experience for each user. Personalization is crucial because it builds a deeper connection with the participant, making them feel valued rather than just a faceless lead in a database.
• Increased Retention. When users actively participate in your campaign, they’re more likely to remember your brand and return for future interactions. This retention is important because the more touchpoints you have with a lead, the more likely they are to convert into a paying customer.

Take a look at the example above. The Eastwood Company is a supplier of car restoration products that organizes interactive digital promotions on a regular basis. The organizers share their lead generation digital promotions on all their social media accounts and share the link to the promotion, making it easy for users to participate.

Sharing Interactive Promotions in Social Media

Social media platforms are built for interaction, which makes them the ideal place for sharing interactive promotions. Platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok thrive on user participation and sharing, creating the perfect environment for these types of campaigns. These are some of the reasons why interactive promotions for lead generation should be shared on social media:

• Massive Reach. With billions of active users across platforms, social media offers access to a massive audience. Whether you’re targeting Baby Boomers on Facebook, Millennials on Instagram, or Gen Z on TikTok, social media allows you to reach a highly diverse audience.
• Targeting Capabilities. One of the key advantages of using social media for lead generation is the ability to precisely target your audience. Platforms like Facebook and Instagram offer advanced targeting features based on demographics, interests, behaviors, and even past interactions with your brand.
• Instant Engagement. Social media operates in real-time, allowing you to instantly engage with your audience. Users can participate in your interactive promotions the moment you post them, and the social sharing capabilities can amplify your campaign’s reach within minutes.
• Built-In Virality. Interactive content is highly shareable, and social media is designed to spread content virally. When a user engages with your promotion, it often appears in their followers’ feeds, encouraging others to participate as well.

The example above comes from the Spanish plasters brand “Tiritas”. Since the product is aimed at children, the brand launched a digital Memory Game based on the video game character “Bluey”. Players with the highest scores entered a final prize draw for the chance of winning a costume for Carnival. The brand uses its social media accounts to share their promotions and to provide the access links to users.

Choosing the Right Platform to Launch a Social Media Lead Generation Campaign

Once you have decided what type of interactive promotion best suits your audience and objectives, you will be faced with a crucial decision that will make or break your social media lead generation campaign: choosing the right platform. The platform you select directly impacts how well your promotion performs, how easily you collect leads, and how efficiently you can manage the campaign.

With this in mind, theses are some of the key issues you have to pay attention to when choosing a platform:

• Customization possibilities. Your platform should offer flexible design and branding options to ensure your promotions align with your brand’s identity.
• Data-collection capabilities. The platform should provide robust options for capturing leads, offering customizable forms to gather the information you need while remaining compliant with privacy laws like GDPR.
• Ease of use. Your platform should streamline the process of setting up, launching, and managing campaigns without requiring advanced technical skills. This way, your team can focus on strategy and engagement, not wrestling with complex software.
• Integration capabilities. Make sure that the platform you choose allows for a seamless integration with your CRM tools. After all, that is the whole point of your social media lead generation campaign.

Wrapping it up

Social media lead generation through interactive promotions is an incredibly effective strategy for capturing high-quality leads, and Easypromos offers a powerful, user-friendly solution to make it happen. By combining the reach and engagement potential of social media with the interactive nature of quizzes, contests, and games, you can create memorable experiences that not only capture leads but also drive deeper brand engagement.

We hope you found this article useful to help you create your social media lead generation campaign. If you have any question about Easypromos or our platform, contact us via live-chat. We will be happy to help!

Marketing in the digital age is all about engagement. It’s not enough to just present your audience with information; you need to interact with them, make them feel involved, and ultimately guide them towards a desired action. Enter the multiple choice test, a simple yet powerful tool that can elevate your marketing promotions to a whole new level.

You might be wondering, “Multiple-choice tests? Aren’t those just for school exams?” Well, think again! In the world of interactive marketing, a multiple-choice test can serve as an engaging and versatile promotional tool, offering a unique way to connect with your audience, gather valuable data, and drive conversions. Let’s dive into why and how you should be using these tests in your marketing strategy.

Why a Multiple Choice Test Works

Interactive and Engaging

The beauty of multiple-choice tests lies in their ability to engage users in an active way. Unlike static content, such as blog posts or infographics, a quiz or test demands participation. When someone takes a multiple-choice test, they’re not just passively consuming information—they’re actively involved in the experience. This interaction helps to create a deeper connection with your brand, making it more memorable.

Easy to Create and Share

Creating a multiple-choice test is relatively easy and, if you are using Easypromos, doesn’t require programming skills. Once created, these tests are also incredibly shareable. Social media platforms, email newsletters, and even your website can serve as perfect outlets for promoting your quiz, allowing you to reach a wider audience with minimal effort.

Data Collection Goldmine

One of the biggest advantages of using multiple-choice tests in marketing is the data collection potential. Every answer a participant gives can provide insight into their preferences, behaviors, and needs. This data is invaluable for crafting more personalized and targeted marketing campaigns down the line. By analyzing the responses, you can segment your audience more effectively and deliver tailored content that resonates with them on a deeper level.

Boost Lead Generation

Multiple-choice tests are not just fun and games; they can be serious tools for lead generation. By asking participants to fill out a registration form before they see their results, you can easily capture new leads. This approach is particularly effective because it feels more like an exchange of value—the participant gets to enjoy the quiz and learn something about themselves, and you get valuable user data for future marketing efforts.

Choosing the Right Multiple Choice Test Maker

These are all valid and desirable marketing objectives. However, there is a crucial decision to be made. Which multiple choice test maker from among those in the market should you choose? Here are some key issues that you should look for to be able to achieve your objectives:

• Ease of use. One of the most important factors is the tool’s usability. You want a platform that offers a user-friendly interface and does not require programming skills.
• Customizable registration forms. As this is where data collection takes place, being able yo decide which information fields to include in the Quiz registration form is paramount. Make sure you can include text fields, drop down menus, and check boxes at the very least.
• Customization options. Your multiple choice test should reflect your brand’s identity, from the design and layout to the tone of the questions. Look for a tool that allows for extensive customization: color schemes, fonts, logos, buttons, background images, etc. This ensures that your quiz not only engages users but also reinforces your brand image.
• Integration capabilities. The ability to integrate with your existing marketing stack is another key consideration. Whether you’re using CRM software, email marketing platforms, or social media tools, your multiple-choice test platform should easily connect with these systems. This integration is vital for automating data collection, lead nurturing, and follow-up actions.
• Analytics and reporting. Data is the backbone of any successful marketing campaign. Choose a tool that offers robust analytics and reporting features that provide insights into user preferences and behaviors. This will help you refine your strategies and improve future campaigns.
• Mobile responsiveness. Make sure that your multiple-choice tests look and function seamlessly across all screen sizes, providing a smooth and engaging user experience.

Among the many options available, Easypromos ticks all these boxes and more! Create engaging, data-driven campaigns that resonate with your audience and drive meaningful results.

Examples of Multiple Choice Tests

Now that we’ve covered the “why,” let’s dive into some real-world examples of how to use them effectively in marketing. Your multiple choice test can be presented if different formats and each serves a different marketing objective—whether it’s to gather data, drive sales, enhance engagement, or build brand awareness. By choosing the right format and aligning it with your specific goals, you can create powerful marketing campaigns that resonate with your audience and achieve meaningful results.

Personality Quiz

A personality quiz is a highly effective type of multiple-choice test that can be easily customized to align with your brand. For instance, a home decor brand might develop a quiz called, “What’s Your Christmas Decor Style?” This quiz would prompt users to answer questions about their color preferences, design aesthetics, and the overall vibe they want for their holiday decorations. At the end of the quiz, participants would receive a tailored recommendation for their ideal Christmas decor style, along with a link to shop for suggested items. This approach not only captivates users but also promotes direct sales.

Try this Christmas Personality Quiz DEMO for the full user experience!

Knowledge Quizzes and Trivia

A Knowledge Quiz can be a great way to educate your audience while subtly promoting your products or services. For instance, a wine cellar might develop a quiz titled, “Are you a wine expert?” Participants would answer questions about various types of wines, grape varieties, and wine regions. At the end of the quiz, the results could suggest wine selections or special tasting events related to the wines featured, leveraging the user’s increased interest in wine.

Product Recommender

A product recommender quiz is designed to help users find the perfect product that meets their needs. For example, a gift shop could offer a quiz titled, “What’s the Best Gift for Dad on Father’s Day?” The quiz would ask questions about your dad’s hobbies, interests, and preferences, such as whether he enjoys cooking, technology, or outdoor activities. Based on the responses, the quiz would recommend the ideal gift options tailored to your dad’s unique personality, with direct links to the product pages for easy purchasing.

Survey Quiz

A Survey is a strategic way to better understand your audience and tailor content to their specific interests. For example, a bookstore might create a survey titled, “What’s Your Favorite Literary Genre?” The survey would ask participants about their reading preferences, favorite authors, and preferred book formats. Based on their responses, the bookstore could segment the audience into different groups, such as those who love mystery novels, fantasy enthusiasts, or fans of historical fiction. This segmentation allows the bookstore to send highly targeted follow-up content, such as personalized book recommendations or exclusive offers, ensuring that each reader receives content that resonates with their literary tastes.

How to Create an Effective Multiple Choice Test

Ready to jump on the multiple-choice test bandwagon? Here are some tips to ensure your test is both engaging and effective:

• Know Your Audience. What are their interests, pain points, and motivations? The more you know about your audience, the more relevant and appealing your test will be.
• Craft Compelling Questions. Your questions should be clear, concise, and interesting. Avoid making them too easy or too difficult—striking the right balance is key to keeping users engaged. Also, be sure to keep the tone conversational and aligned with your brand voice.
• Incorporate Visuals. Adding images or videos to your test can make it more visually appealing and enhance the user experience. For example, if you’re creating a product match quiz, include images of the products in the answer options.
• Provide Value. Your quiz should offer something valuable in return for the participant’s time. This could be personalized recommendations, a fun result that they can share with friends, or even better, a discount code at the end of the quiz. The more value you provide, the more likely participants are to complete the test and share it with others.
• Optimize for Mobile. Many users will take your test on their smartphones, so it’s important to ensure that the experience is seamless across all devices. Make sure your quiz is mobile-friendly, with easy-to-tap answer options and fast loading times.

Use Cases: Where and When to Deploy Your Multiple Choice Test

Multiple-choice tests can be used at various stages of the customer journey, from awareness to conversion. Here are some scenarios where they shine:

Top of Funnel (Awareness)

At the top of the funnel, you can use quizzes to attract new audiences. For example, a financial planning firm might create a quiz like, “How Prepared Are You for Retirement?” to engage users who are just beginning to think about their financial future. This type of quiz helps introduce your brand and start the conversation with potential customers.

Middle of Funnel (Consideration)

In the consideration phase, multiple-choice tests can help prospects narrow down their choices and find the right product. For example, a home appliance company could offer a quiz titled, “Which Coffee Maker Fits Your Morning Routine?” This quiz would ask about brewing preferences, kitchen space, and budget, then guide users to the coffee maker that aligns best with their needs. By offering tailored suggestions, the quiz simplifies the decision-making process, making it easier for customers to choose the perfect appliance for their home.

Bottom of Funnel (Conversion)

Finally, at the bottom of the funnel, you can use quizzes to nudge prospects towards a purchase. For example, a furniture retailer might create a quiz titled, “Which Sofa Style Matches Your Living Room?” The quiz could ask about the user’s space dimensions, color preferences, and design tastes, then link the results directly to product pages featuring recommended sofas. By offering tailored suggestions, the quiz helps customers find the perfect fit for their home, making it easier to drive conversions and close the sale.

Conclusion

In the world of interactive marketing, multiple-choice tests are an incredibly effective tool for engaging your audience, collecting valuable data, and driving conversions. While there are many tools available to create and manage these campaigns, Easypromos provides you with all the necessary features necessary to make your campaign a resounding success.

If you have any question regarding our platform or applications, don’t hesitate to contact us via live chat. We will be happy to help!

Finding and choosing the best giveaway tool in today’s fast-paced digital world, where everyone is fighting for a slice of potential customers’ attention, is no easy feat. Giveaways don’t just grab your audience’s attention; they create buzz around your brand. By creating excitement, giveaways help you stand out from the crowd, boost your social media presence, and build deeper connections with your audience. Sounds like a treat, right? Well, all that is true if, and only if, your giveaway is created and managed right. If you’re looking to up your marketing game, it’s high time you learn how to create and manage your giveaway with the best tool available in the market. So keep on reading, the best is yet to come!

We can group giveaways in two broad groups:

• Social Media Giveaways for Brand Awareness: Social media giveaways are ideal for getting your brand noticed. By encouraging participants to like, share, and comment on your posts, you create a ripple effect that spreads your brand’s message far and wide. This not only boosts your visibility but also helps you gain more followers and potential customers.
• Entry Form Giveaways for Data Collection: Entry form giveaways are your go-to for gathering valuable user data. By asking participants to fill out a registration form, you can collect important information like email addresses, preferences, and interests. This data is gold for future marketing campaigns, helping you tailor your messages and offers to better suit your audience’s needs.

Try this Christmas Giveaway DEMO to get a feel of the user experience and design customization possibilities.

How to choose the best giveaway tool

When you’re ready to dive into the world of giveaway apps, you’ll want to make sure you’re using the right one to manage your promotions. The perfect giveaway tool should make your life easier and check all the right boxes. Here’s what you should be looking for:

• Ease of Use: The last thing you need is a tool that’s a pain to use. You want something that’s easy to navigate so you can quickly set up and manage your giveaways without any headaches.
• Security: Protecting your participants’ data is crucial. You need a tool that keeps their information safe and secure, following all the latest data protection regulations.
• Reliability: You need a tool that won’t crash or glitch when things get busy. Your giveaway should run smoothly from start to finish, without any technical hiccups.
• Official Social Media API’s: If your planning to run a giveaway on social media, choosing a tool that uses the network’s official API to collect participating entries is not only convenient, it will also save you some major headaches and even the possibility of your account being suspended.
• Transparency and Randomness: It’s essential to have a random draw app that proves to participants that the draw is random and fair. This builds trust and ensures everyone feels the giveaway is legitimate.
• Winner Communication: Announcing and communicating with winners is a key part of any giveaway. You need a tool that makes it easy to notify winners and handle the prize claim process.

The pitfalls of not using the right tool

Choosing the wrong tool for your giveaways can lead to a host of problems. You might end up dealing with complicated setups, security breaches, and technical glitches that frustrate both you and your participants. If your tool doesn’t comply with social media guidelines, you risk getting your account suspended or your giveaway taken down. Moreover, without a verified, transparent, and random draw system, participants might question the fairness of your giveaway, damaging your brand’s reputation. And let’s not forget the headache of manually managing winner communication and prize claims – it’s a recipe for chaos and confusion.

The best giveaway tool in the market

Now that you know what to look for and the potential pitfalls to avoid, let’s talk about why Easypromos is the best giveaway tool int eh market:

Easy to use

The Easypromos promotion editor requires zero programming skills, you’ll find it a breeze to set up and manage your giveaways. From picking the type of giveaway to customizing the look and feel to match your brand, the editor is easy to use and intuitive. Plus, you can use one of many pre-built templates and customization options, making it super simple to create a giveaway that’s uniquely yours.

Top-notch security

At Easypromos, we take security seriously. Our platform is fully compliant with data protection regulations like the GDPR and CCPA, so you can rest easy knowing that your participants’ data is safe and sound. This level of security helps build trust with your audience, which is crucial for any successful marketing campaign.

Rock-solid reliability

When you’re running a giveaway, the last thing you want is for your platform to crash under the weight of too many entries. With Easypromos, you won’t have to worry about that. Our system is built to handle large volumes of traffic and entries without breaking a sweat. This means you can focus on making your giveaway a success without stressing over technical issues.

Social media integration

Easypromos really shines when it comes to social media integration, making it super easy to connect your giveaway with your social media accounts, so you can reach your audience where they’re most active. Features like social media sharing buttons and seamless integration with social media API’s help you get your giveaway in front of more people and encourage participants to share the love with their networks.

Certificate of validity for random draws

One of our standout features at Easypromos is the Certificate of Validity for random draws. This certificate provides proof that the winner selection process is transparent and fair, which is crucial for building trust with your participants. The certificate details the draw process and confirms that it was conducted without any bias or manipulation. With this feature, you can easily reassure your audience that your giveaway is legitimate and the selection process is above board.

Customizable registration forms

Easypromos offers customizable registration forms, which are perfect for gathering the data you need. Whether you’re looking for email addresses, demographic info, or specific preferences, you can tailor the entry form to collect exactly what you’re looking for. This feature not only makes it easy to gather data but also ensures you’re getting the most relevant information for your marketing needs.

Announce winners with a customized video

Announce the winners of your giveaway in style using “Show Mode”. This feature allows you to create a customized video with your brand colors and imagery which you can then share in social media in vertical or horizontal format.

“Claim Your Prize” feature

With Easypromos, it is easy to announce and communicate with winners through the “Claim Your Prize” feature. Once the winners are selected, the system allows you to contact the winners directly. This not only streamlines the process for you but also ensures that winners are notified quickly and efficiently. It’s a win-win for everyone involved!

Seamless integration with other Easypromos dynamics

All Easypromos apps in the catalog can seamlessly integrate a giveaway at the end to reward registered users. Whether running a quiz, survey, or photo contest, you can easily add a final giveaway to engage participants, increase participation rates, and reward users. This approach not only enhances user experience but also maximizes the overall impact of your promotion.

Flexibility, scalability and live chat customer support

If you ever run into any issues or need a bit of help, our customer support team is ready to assist you via live chat. Whether you’re setting up your giveaway or have questions about compliance, we are available to provide support and guidance so you can confidently use the platform and get the most out of your promotions.

No matter the size of your business or the complexity of your giveaway, the Easypromos platform has the flexibility and scalability to meet your needs, from simple sweepstakes to interactive contests and quizzes. This versatility makes the Easypromos the best giveaway tool it a great choice for your brand.

Infographic: 14 Reasons to Run Giveaways with Easypromos

We hope you fin this information useful and that it has brought some light upon what to look for when choosing the best giveaway tool. If you would like to receive more information, you can contact our customer support team via live chat. We will be happy to help!

We are often asked how to create exclusive giveaways for subscribers and ways to encourage participants to sign up for a newsletter to participate in promotions. This feature achieves both objectives.

How to create an exclusive giveaway for subscribers

If you enable the Mailchimp list restriction and link the desired subscriber list, every user who wants to register for the giveaway or promotion must be a subscriber to participate. If they are not, you can customize the information window with a link to the subscription form. This way, users interested in the offer but not on the list can subscribe there and then.

Experience what is like to participate in an exclusive promotion for subscribers of your Mailchimp list and sign up for our newsletter!

Other ways to encourage subscription to your newsletter

If you manage your email marketing campaigns with another provider, there are still ways to create restricted giveaways. For example:

• Upload a list with all the emails of your newsletter current subscribers to the promotion. Use the “Set of codes” feature, and when a user wants to register for the giveaway, the platform will verify that they are on the uploaded email list. Only those email addresses are allowed to register, and those not listed and rejected can sign up for the newsletter and participate in the following month’s giveaway.
• Connect to the Easypromos API to enroll users who register from your campaign manager in a monthly giveaway. Check out the Easypromos webhooks and integration tools.
• An easier way is to announce a giveaway among all subscribers on a specific day, encouraging them to sign up for the newsletter before that date. On that day, you can download all the subscribers and randomly select a winner with our Pick-a-winner app.

There are many ways to encourage subscriptions to your newsletter and to retain those who already receive them. If you are unsure which strategy is best for your brand or product, contact our customer service team, we will be happy to help!

Using single-use codes

In this type of Purchase to Win promotion, customers receive a single-use code after the purchase, which they use to access the promotion.

• If the purchase takes place at a brick-and-mortar point of sale, it is advisable to give the code printed on a card with a QR code that links to the promotion and the single-use code.
• For online purchases, it is best to include the code in the thank you email or purchase confirmation email.

Advantages of single-use codes

• It is a reliable method to ensure that only paying customers participate in the promotion.
• It is easy to communicate as users are used to managing codes to access exclusive promotions.
• Many tools facilitate the generation of single-use codes: ChatGPT, Excel, etc.
• Allows the mass management of codes. The Easypromos Redeem Codes application can manage promotions involving millions of codes.

Disadvantages of single-use codes

• For physical stores, it is necessary to distribute a set of codes to each establishment.
• If the code is distributed in print format, the cards containing the code and QR access to the promotion must be designed and printed.
• If the code is distributed digitally, the feature to generate single-use codes in the purchase process has to be enabled, which requires involving the IT team.

Common case uses

• Single-use code validation is ideal for retail promotions where millions of codes are distributed. For example, codes printed under a yogurt lid or inside a soda cap.
• Code validation is recommendable whenever there it is possible to place a code inside a product’s packaging.
• Code validation works well when combined with the “virtual coins” feature. As customers validate the codes they receive, they accumulate virtual coins that can be exchanged for prizes.

Automatic purchase receipt validation with OCR

The customer must upload an image of the purchase receipt. The system scans it and determines the validity of the receipt in real-time. The entire process takes just a few seconds.

• Using OCR technology, the system can read any textual information on the receipt. The validation rules are applied based on what the system reads.
• The rules for determining whether a ticket is valid are configured by the promotion administrator. The rules can take into account the total amount of the receipt, the date, and any text string that appears printed on the ticket.
• Promotional actions with automatic ticket validation are typically applied to receipts over a specific total amount. For example: Upload a ticket from our store over €20 and participate in a Scratch and Win dynamic.
• The concept of a “purchase receipt” is quite broad. The system can validate a classic purchase receipt and other documents, such as a movie ticket or a race bib number. For example, if a user participated in a Marathon, they can upload their bib number to win direct prizes.

Advantages of the OCR validation

• The main advantage of the Validate Receipts app is its full automation capability. Once the validation process is configured, no extra intervention is needed and the daily operation works in “automatic pilot” mode.
• Ease of use: the buyer is completely autonomous when participating in the promotion and does not have to interact with the store staff. Usually, they scan the QR code found in the store to participate; first, they register, then upload their receipt, and if valid, they can participate in the promotional dynamic.
• Management of accumulated receipts by amount. Design dynamics to reward customers if they reach a total sum. For example, rewarding customers who exceed $1,000 in purchases. This amount can be reached with a single receipt of $1,000 or 10 receipts of €100.
• The Easypromos OCR technology includes duplicate management. The system detects if the same file has been uploaded more than once and if a user tries to upload a different photo of the same ticket. Additionally, to prevent duplicates, you can define a validation rule on the receipt numbering, asking the user to enter the receipt number, and the system will verify that it appears on the ticket and has not been used before.
• Data analysis: the system stores the textual information of all receipts. This information can be retrieved for later analysis.

Disadvantages of OCR validation

• Although validation rules can be very sophisticated, it is challenging to establish a set of rules that cover many different receipt formats. Therefore, a disadvantage of OCR is that it can only be used in situations with few ticket formats.
• It is impossible to set validation rules that control the amount of a particular product. You can only verify the presence of that product but not how many units are purchased. For example: You can decide that a ticket is valid if the text on the receipt includes product XYZ, but you cannot establish a rule that controls how much of the total corresponds to product XYZ. The only amount you can control is the total ticket amount (including taxes).

Common case uses

• OCR ticket validation is optimal when working with a single receipt format. For example, promotions for a gas station chain, a supermarket chain, a coffee shop chain, or a fast food chain. Since only one format is available, you can be very specific when creating the validation rules.
• Another situation where OCR validation is very suitable is when you control the POS system because you can add specific phrases or hashtags for the ongoing promotion. You can then include these phrases as a requirement in the receipt validation rules. Additionally, you can also add a QR code to access the promotion so that the ticket includes all the necessary information to participate.
• If you wish to distribute direct prizes without prior manual validation, for example, in a fast food chain, customers get a spin of a prize wheel for every ticket over $20 with the wheel offering prizes like free drinks and fries. OCR validation is the only system that allows the promotion to operate autonomously, on a large scale, with minimal monitoring, and in ‘auto-pilot’ mode.

Receipt validation with pre-moderation

The customer uploads an image of the purchase receipt, and the participation is paused until the receipt is reviewed and validated by someone from the organization.

• Once the receipt has been validated, the customer receives an email with a link inviting them to continue participating.
• If the ticket is invalid, the customer receives an email indicating why the ticket is not valid.
• This validation flow supports the same dynamics as OCR validation. However, it is not executed in real time.
• The promotion organizer will have a section in the Easypromos back office where they can visualize all the receipts received and can easily validate or reject them.
• The pre-moderation system is designed to be outsourced, allowing an external team to focus solely on receipt validation.
• During manual ticket validation, the moderator can assign more participation chances based on what the ticket shows. For example, in the case of a digital stamp card, the moderator could give stamps based on the total amount of the receipt.

Advantages of receipt pre-moderation

• Pre-moderation makes it possible to reward purchases in scenarios with many different receipt formats. For example, when a product is sold in many supermarkets and each store has its ticket own format.
• As with pre-moderation, every ticket goes through a person’s review, you can create promotions with complex rules. For example, rewarding customers who have bought X units of a specific product or spent more than X amount on your brand’s products.

Disadvantages or receipt pre-moderation

• The user experience is not as smooth as with OCR validation because the user’s participation is paused until their ticket has been reviewed. The validation time depends on the number of receipts in the moderation queue and how many people are available to review receipts.
• More resources (people and time) are needed to speed up the validation cycle as much as possible. In national promotions where hundreds of thousands of tickets are generated, it is important to correctly size the team of moderators to ensure receipts are validated as quickly as possible, or customers may lose interest in the promotion.

Common case uses

• The most common scenario involves consumer brand promotions in stores and supermarkets. Since it is impossible to create a common set of rules for all the receipt formats where their products appear, manual pre-moderation is usually implemented.
• Another situation where manual pre-moderation is used is to reward customers based on the number of units of a specific product purchased. For example, a cola brand wants to reward everyone who has bought a can of soda and a bag of chips. This type of dynamic is only possible with manual ticket validation.

Receipt validation after the final prize draw

The customer uploads an image of the purchase receipt and participates in a final draw. After randomly selecting the winner and the alternates, the promotion organizers review the winner’s receipts to ensure they are valid. If any receipt does not meet the participation conditions, the winner is replaced by the first alternate, and so on until a winner with a valid receipt is found.

• This type of promotion can only be carried out with promotions with a final prize draw and it is not recommendable for direct prize dynamics.
• It is the digital version of the old-days dynamics where product labels had to be mailed in, and a prize draw was carried out among all participants.
• The key to this type of promotion is that, even if it is massive and thousands or hundreds of thousands of tickets are received, the organizer only has to validate the winner’s and/or alternates’ receipts. Purchase receipts uploaded by the rest of participants can be disregarded.

Advantages of receipt validation after the final prize draw

• It is the simplest validation system available. The configuration is minimal.
• Seamless participation flow. The customer uploads the receipt and their participation is immediately validated.
• It has low incident management because there are no rejected purchase receipts, keeping complaints to almost zero.

Disadvantages or receipt validation with pre-moderation

• It is a type of validation that only works with a final prize draw.
• It is paramount to make it clear in the terms and conditions that if the winner submits a receipt that does not meet the promotion conditions, they will be automatically disqualified.

Common use cases

• A common case is that of an association of business owners that wants to hold a Christmas raffle among all customers who have purchased in any of the participating stores. Since these are different shops with different receipt formats, OCR is not an option, so the receipt validation after the final prize draw is the optimal solution.
• It is also used by consumer brands that want to reward their customers and do not want to use pre-moderation.

Purchase validation through a dynamic QR code

In this scenario, the customer scans a QR code provided by the shop assistant during the purchase process. This dynamic is closely linked to promotions such as a digital Stamp Card where the customer receives a stamp for each purchase, consumption, or service. Picture a coffee shop with a digital stamp card to reinforce customer loyalty and recurrence. After ordering a coffee and a croissant, the staff who attended the customer will show them a QR code. As the customer scans it, the card is automatically stamped.

• The Easypromos platform manages both static and dynamic QR codes. In the case of ‘Purchase to Win’ promotions, we recommend using dynamic QRs to ensure that the same QR cannot be reused.
• Easypromos features an integrated dynamic QR code generator within the platform’s tools. Store staff only need a mobile phone or tablet to show the QR code to the customer.

Advantages of receipt validation through dynamic QR code

• The purchase validation process with a dynamic QR transfers the experience of getting a stamp from the establishment to the digital world. There is no physical card, no need to download any app or store anything in the phone’s wallet.
• The customer does not have to worry about managing the card. By scanning the dynamic QR, they directly access the digital stamp card. This way, the customer does not need to remember where they saved it or if they have previously registered. The system recognizes if it is their first time participating and, in that case, offers a new card. If they participated before, it retrieves the card with the accumulated stamps.
• No additional software is required to scan the QR; it is done directly from the phone’s native camera application.
• Since it is a dynamic QR, there is no possibility of fraud. Once scanned, the QR cannot be reused and will show ‘Invalid QR’ if scanned again.
• If a customer takes a photo of the QR or saves the associated URL on their phone, nothing will happen, as the QR becomes invalid after the first use.
• Store staff can assign more than one stamp in a single QR scan. For example, if you choose to give a stamp for every $10 spent and the customer spends $30, three stamps will be awarded directly when scanning the codes.

Disadvantages of receipt validation through dynamic QR codes

• The main drawback is that scanning a dynamic QR is not a fully automated process; there must always be intervention from the store staff to show the QR to the customer.
• Store staff need a mobile phone or tablet to access the Easypromos vendor portal, where the dynamic QR generator is located.
• It is important to train the staff on how to use the Easypromos vendor portal. The training, however, is very simple as the portal has a ‘generate code’, but it is still necessary.

Common use cases

• The most straightforward case would be a physical store that wants to reward its customers’ purchases and does not want to implement code or OCR receipt validation. After paying for their purchase, the store staff will show the customer the dynamic QR and encourage them to participate in the promotion; for example, a Scratch and Win for all purchases over $15.
• The scenario where dynamic QR validation makes the most sense is when implementing digital stamp cards for local businesses: coffee shops, beauty centers, and sports clubs with court rentals (soccer, paddle tennis, tennis, etc.).
• Another ideal situation is in promotions where direct prizes are distributed, but there are many formats of purchase receipts, and pre-moderation cannot be applied. For example, promotions in a shopping center where all purchases over €30 are rewarded.

Purchase validation with integration with the sales system

In this case, the promotion organizer has an IT application to attribute purchases to their customers. The paradigm example is an e-commerce application but also applies to loyalty portals that digitally collect sales made in physical stores.

Easypromos has a comprehensive catalog of APIs to integrate with any sales system and reward buyers with direct prizes and dynamics available only to those who have made a purchase. For example, for every purchase over $10 from e-commerce, customers get a chance to spin a prize wheel.

Advantages of integrating purchase validation with sales system

• The user experience is very natural. The user perceives participation in the promotion as something fully integrated into the e-commerce.
• It does not require the voluntary participation of the customer; the promotion appears as another step in the purchase process. For example: after buying a plane ticket, the system allows the user to participate in a Scratch and Win where they can win direct discounts for their next purchase.
• It is possible to automatically segment customers and offer different dynamics and prizes based on the segmentation. For example, Gold customers have access to different promotions than Silver customers.
• The promotion organizer has total control over when and at what point in the purchase flow the promotion will appear.
• Integration with the sales system is total: Easypromos integrates with the registered user system, shows up in a widget if the application is web-based, or in a webview if the application is mobile-based.
• Everything that happens within the promotion in Easypromos can be exported via REST API or Webhook. Picture a promotion within a loyalty portal. Users who have spent more than $100 in the last month can participate in a prize wheel. The wheel distributes virtual coins. The customer spins the wheel and gets 1,000 virtual coins, and these virtual coins update their coin balance in real time on the brand’s loyalty portal.
• Any Easypromos dynamic can be integrated with an external sales system, not only direct prize dynamics but also games, quiz dynamics, giveaways, digital stamp cards, and multi-stage promotions.

Disadvantages of the integration with the sales system

• The main drawback is that, unlike the other methods, this requires the intervention of the promotion organizer’s technical department.
• Conceptually, the integration is very simple, it can be summarized in a few calls to the Easypromos API, but the promotion organizer will have to carry out some degree of development on their e-commerce, mobile application, or loyalty portal to make those calls.
• Since development is necessary, this type of integration takes more implementation time than the other alternatives presented in this article.

Common case uses

• The most frequent scenario to consider integration with the sales system is when you wish to reward the customer within the purchase flow. For example, in an e-commerce, once the purchase has been paid for, a screen may come up saying “Participate in our Scratch and Win”.
• Given the technical nature of this option, it might seem that it only applies to online purchases, but you can also reward purchases made in physical stores. This is common in loyalty portals where customers accumulate points for all purchases made in the brand’s physical stores. The portal registers all purchases, so it’s just a matter of deciding when to show the Easypromos promotion. For example, a call to action can be activated when the customer has exceeded $500 in purchases. More sophisticated actions can also be implemented, such as giving stamps based on the type of product purchased and rewarding upon completing the stamp card to stimulate the sale of a specific range of products.

Conclusions

Easypromos offers a broad, robust, and flexible set of tools to verify purchases in “Purchase to Win” promotions, adapting to different needs and scenarios.

If you want to learn more about them or see how these solutions can be integrated into your business, contact our sales team. We will be happy to set up a personalized demo or provide you with more information regarding our tools.

Coins to Give Value to Participant Actions

In promotions where users can participate more than once, offering coins as a reward is an appealing option. Everyone understands coins as a currency that can be exchanged for products. And so, give them an intrinsic value.

Try the following Validate Codes DEMO. When users register and verify their code, they earn coins, which they can accumulate in their wallets. Users can check their coin balance at any time and access the rewards list to check the cost of each prize.

When a user has enough coins for the desired prize, they can redeem it. When a prize is redeemed, the system can send an automatic email to confirm the transaction and provide instructions to claim the prize. Additionally, the promotion organizer can receive a notification each time someone redeems coins for a prize and access statistics on prize stock to manage or replenish it if necessary.

Turning Purchases into Points

If what you want is to turn customers’ purchases into points that can be accumulated and included in your loyalty program, the “virtual coins” feature will also serve this purpose. Take a look at the following demo of purchase ticket validation. For each ticket uploaded, the user earns 25 points. These can be accumulated within the same promotion or linked, via API, to your customer loyalty program to be added to points from other actions.

Play Games to Earn Points

Games are a good dynamic to interact with your audience. Typically, participants are rewarded for being at the top of the players’ ranking. However, there are other ways to reward players, such as giving out coins for each challenge completed.

Games imply an emotional reward and provide added value to a brand’s customer rewards system. What’s more, brands can create their “own” currency, be it points, stars, kudos, etc.

View Content to Earn Points

Yet another action you can reward with coins is viewing or reading brand content. You can deliver text, images, or video within your promotion and require users to view it to complete the challenge. If you use the “requirement” function, users must watch the entire video to complete the action and earn coins.

You can also link to content to read or embed a video and a quiz that users must answer to earn coins. In this case, you can give coins to participants who answer the questions or only to those who get a certain number of correct answers.

You can try this action, and others, by participating in this loyalty portal demo.

Reward participants who follow you on social media

You can also reward users who decide to follow you on social media. Even if it is not possible to verify it automatically, you can include a button to redirect them to your social media profile for them to follow you. Participants who visit the profile from that button will count as followers and will be awarded points. In the following example, each of the brand’s social media profiles links are displayed. For each social network followed, users earn 5 points.

Earning Coins for Daily Recurrence

Do you want to present daily content and ensure your users view it? Present each content in a stage and ask users to check-in. The key to having users visit the website regularly is to reward them for it. Besides interesting content, offer them the incentive of earning points, and you’ll see how they get used to visiting the site daily.

You can present it in various forms: videos with trivia questions, content in image or text format with a link to a website, timed quizzes, etc. In the end, coins, points, or stars are a way to reward your audience and achieve engagement in long-term promotions. Such promotions can work as your brand’s loyalty program, as they allow you to present multiple actions to interact with your audience, a unique registration per user, and a profile where they can check their points and the prizes they can redeem them for.

Have you considered rewarding participants in your promotions with virtual coins? Try it now with the Easypromos White Label or Corporate Plan. This feature allows you to:

• Name your coin and upload its image.
• Assign prizes that are coins in many microsite-type dynamics: quizzes, UGC, check-in, ticket validation, etc.
• Decide how many coins are earned in each action.
• Determine how many coins are needed to redeem each gift.

When to run a contest on social media

Because of their very nature, social media platforms provide the perfect platform for your brand if you are looking to:

• Enhance brand visibility and create a buzz around your brand.
• Expand your social media presence and grow your follower base organically.
• Increase engagement and create meaningful exchanges between your brand and your audience.
• Promote your products and turn followers into brand ambassadors.

Let’s take a look at the kind of social media contest that you can launch to achieve these objectives.

Social media contest: Giveaways

A giveaway is the most popular kind of social media contest, and if done correctly and with the right tools, one of the easiest to create and manage too. In case you were wondering, by “the right tools” we mean a platform that uses the official API of the social network where you’re running the giveaway.

Running a giveaway on social media is straightforward and effective. It is also a good first step to grow your brand’s social media presence and reach before moving into more complex contests. It should also go without saying that the prize you offer should be both attractive and relevant to your target audience. The most logical option is to give away one of your products as it would naturally appeal to your audience and is a great way to promote your brand.

The next step is to decide the participation dynamics and requirements. Asking participants to comment on the giveaway post is simple and engaging. You can also ask them to tag someone in their comment to help your giveaway go viral but don’t overdo it. A short answer and one tag is enough. Finally, you should choose the social network to run your giveaway on. With Easypromos, you can organize giveaways on Instagram, Facebook, and X.

All the Easypromos giveaway apps provide random winner selection, winners and alternate management, and a certificate of validity to ensure fairness and transparency.

Social media contest to gather UGC and generate leads

As much as a social media contest is great for brand awareness and exposure, you might be looking into taking your social media contest a step further to collect user data and user-generated content. If this is your case, you will need a more comprehensive solution. Enter the “Mention + Hashtag” and the “Hashtag + Entry form” contests by Easypromos, which allow you to collect UGC and contact details respectively.

Collect UGC with a Mention + Hashtag social media contest

The Mention + Hashtag contest offers the dual benefit of collecting high-quality UGC that can be imported to the contest gallery and the option of enabling public voting for the audience to vote for their favorite, giving your social media contest greater reach and higher levels of engagement. Participants upload their participating content to their Instagram profiles with your campaign hashtag, and photos and videos from the feed will be automatically imported to the contest app.

In the example above, the ABB professional basketball team Girona Basket launched a Mention + Hashtag photo contest among its followers. Participants had to upload a photo of themselves in the teams fan zone and mention the team’s sponsor for the chance to win a prize.

Gather Participants data and UGC with a Hashtag + Entry form social media contest

If your objective is to gather user data, use the Hashtag + Entry Form application to organize an exclusive Instagram photo contest to enhance brand visibility on social media. Invite users to publish a photo on their profile with your campaign hashtag. Users enter the competition by filling in a registration form with their contact details, choosing which of their Instagram photos to use, and accepting the terms and conditions and content permissions.

Participating images will be displayed in a public photo gallery with a unique URL. Share the contest microsite with your audience and personalize it with your branding colors and logo. As an organizer, you can Ppre-moderate competition entries to control which images appear in the gallery.

Stand-alone contest shared on social media

Another option is to organize a stand-alone contest and share the link to access it on your social media accounts. The advantage of this modality is that you will not be restricted to gathering only the data allowed by each social network, as the contest itself will not be held directly on the social network but on its own microsite.

Entry Form Giveaway

The Entry Form Giveaway application allows you to run a giveaway with a fully customizable registration form that you can set up to include the user information that you’re interested in. After setting up your giveaway, simply create a post for your social media profiles and include the access link.

In this example, the car restoration supplies company Eastwood organized a Black Friday Giveaway and shared it on its socials with a link that directed participants to the giveaway’s registration for the chance to win over $10,000 in prizes.

Voting Contest shared on social media

This is the ideal solution to gather UGC and collect user data. Invite your audience to participate by uploading their own photos, videos, or texts and set up a public online voting process. The Voting Contest application features an anti-fraud system to guarantee reliable and fair voting. It’s perfect for engaging your followers and collecting user-generated content. It also allows you to display several options for the audience to choose their favorite videos, stories, designs, or projects.

Diving Special is company specializing in scuba diving trips. The company organized a photo contest directed at their female members. Participants had to submit a photo and the winners were chosen by popular vote. Users who sent their picture could then share the link to the gallery to get more votes, which gave the contest greater reach.

We hope you find this article useful when deciding which is he best option to launch your social media contest. If you have any additional questions, don’t hesitate to contact us via live-chat or request a personalized demos from our sales team. We will. be happy to help!

Whichever sport your club promotes (football, swimming, basketball, baseball, hockey, dance, etc.), implementing marketing strategies will enable you to achieve your goals: attracting new members, fostering team spirit, generating income, developing community relationships, improving sports performance, etc.

Learn more about how to promote a sports club and how to create engaging and interactive promotional actions.

Promotion ideas for sport clubs

There are many ways to promote a sports club. Let’s take a closer look at some digital promotion ideas that you can implement using Easypromos applications.

Foster engagement with social media giveaways

Social media platforms are the ideal showcase to share news, results, and updates from a sports club. However, how can you tap social media algorithms to come up on your fans’ feeds? Use social media giveaways to encourage engagement and interactions with your posts organically. This way, algorithms will consistently show your content on the profiles of those who have interacted with you. Raffle tickets for your games or give away club merchandise.

Valencia Basket often raffles front-row tickets for their games. Users can participate from Instagram or Facebook by commenting on the giveaway post with the hashtag of the game they want to attend. The club runs a Multi-Network giveaway among all the comments on both social networks and selects a single winner for each game.

Take a look at this example of an Instagram giveaway carried out by the Asociación de Futbolistas Españoles (Association of Spanish Footballers). To celebrate the Spanish national team’s participation in the Euroleague and to give visibility to one of its sponsors, the association raffled tickets along with a driving experience.

Digital games for club memebrs and fans

Interactive games capture the attention of fans and help you diversify your content. That’s why gamified actions are always a good idea to entertain the members of your sports club. And even more so when you raffle tickets, merchandise, discounts, autographs, or even meetings with the players!

Once you have set up the game, you can share it on your social media, via email, messaging apps, or even integrate it into your app if you have one. In the following example, Bàsquet Girona and their sponsor YOSOY launched a memory game on the club members’ app. The game featured pairs of images of YOSOY products that users had to find. With this action, the club gave visibility to its sponsor and reinforced brand recall while entertaining its audience. They raffled a YOSOY product bundle among those who completed the challenge.

Give away discounts and merchandising during a game

Promotional actions during a tournament or game are very effective because they directly impact your target audience. Hence, it’s a good idea to give away merchandise and discounts during a game or tournament to enhance your club’s image, promote sponsors, appreciate players, and reward attendees.

The Torretas Paddle Tennis Club celebrated its anniversary with a tournament. The club carried out a digital survey to collect spectator’s contact information. Attendees scanned a QR code to access the survey, answered a couple of questions, and instantly received a discount for a purchase at the club’s store. This strategy also boosted sales at the store.

Boost sponsors’ visibility with contests

Sponsors are crucial elements of any sports club. They provide funding, visibility, reach, credibility and trust, opportunities for future collaborations, etc. Therefore, it’s paramount to acknowledge them and give them visibility from the club’s side. Here’s a contest idea to provide visibility to a sponsor.

Valencia Basket is a Spanish basketball club sponsored by Covirán Supermarkets. To promote their fan zone, they created a contest where fans could take photos at a photocall and upload them to their Instagram profiles with a hashtag and mention of the club and sponsor.

Get the fans involved through interactive promotional actions

Interacting with your fans is crucial to bring your sports club to the spotlight. Create activities that capture their attention and, at the same time, provide information about the club: players, game schedules, and history of the club.

The Easypromos Build Your Team application allows you to create a digital action where users can design their team’s starting lineup using fully customized images ready to be shared digitally. Challenge users to guess the starting lineup, with each correct guess earning a point in the public participant ranking. Let’s see how football team UD Las Palmas used this application before an important match.

Keep followers engaged the whole season with an online tournament bracket

Create an online Tournament Bracket based on your club’s sports season or competition. This action allows for long-lasting interaction and engagement with your fans or club members. Raffle a prize among all participants or reward those who get the most correct guesses.

With the Tournament Bracket application, you can upload the candidates and set up the matchups. This will provide a visual cue for participants to easily follow the tournament and make their predictions for each round.

We can help you create your club’s next promotional action

Easypromos is the most comprehensive and secure platform for creating giveaways, contests, games, and digital experiences to engage, entertain, and reward your audience. Our team of experts is available to advise and assist you when configuring your online promotions.

Register your club on our platform for free and test all the different types of promotions that you can create for your club.

A loyalty card with multiple boxes is a common strategy to reward customers and identify the most loyal ones. Many cards feature numbering or stamps that customers must collect to earn rewards such as exclusive benefits and preferential treatment. A Digital Stamp Card allows you to just that, only entirely online. Keep reading because this is of interest to you!

Punch cards that require stamps

Loyalty cards that collect stamps are common practice among brick-and-mortar shops. Customers get their cards stamped each time they make a purchase. After accumulating a certain number of stamps, they receive a reward or benefit: a discount, a gift, or accumulated points.

Earning points, stamps, or stickers and completing the card is an incentive that works and has a playful component that creates a positive customer experience. Until recently, validation was done by physically showing the card at the point of sale. However, with digitization and the widespread use of smartphones, it is now possible to carry out the entire process digitally.

With Easypromos, you can create a digital punch card for your brand’s customers by creating a microsite with its own URL where users register to create their punch cards. From that moment on, each time they access the microsite, the application allows them to access their card, see how many stamps they have, and validate new purchases.

How do digital punch cards work? These are the most important aspects of their operation:

• Access to the card: The brand can promote the card on physical supports such as brochures or posters in its physical stores to share the access URL. It can also embed it directly on its website, within the customer area, or in its app. Some stores have tablets to facilitate access to their customers’ cards, but most people prefer to get the URL and register from their mobile.
• Purchase validation: Each time customers make a purchase, they access the same URL, identify themselves, and validate the purchase.
• Reward: Once the customer has completed the punch card or has reached a certain number of validations, they can claim a reward.

Get a feel of the user-experience of a digital punch card:

Benefits of creating a digital stamp card

Loyalty cards offer a series of benefits for both companies and customers.

For businesses, these are a tool for customer retention and increasing purchasing frequency. Additionally, the digital format allows for a quicker implementation without the need to produce physical cards, and no programming or external providers are required to create the card, as the platform is very user-friendly, intuitive, and designed for marketing professionals. Furthermore, customer data is gathered from registrations, allowing for a better understanding of the customer, which is rarely possible with physical loyalty cards, as they are not personalized.

Para los clientes las tarjetas de fidelidad significan una forma de ahorro a la hora de comprar sus marcas o productos preferidos. Pero llevarlas siempre encima es una barrera de participación. Con el formato digital, el cliente solo necesita un móvil con acceso a Internet, lo que es muy habitual hoy en día. Además, se puede identificar con su email, su cuenta de red social preferida o su cuenta de Gmail, que son formas rápidas y habituales de identificarse.

For customers, loyalty cards are an opportunity to save when purchasing their favorite brands or products. However, carrying physical cards can be a participation barrier. With the digital format, the customer only needs a mobile phone with internet access, which is standard nowadays. Additionally, customers can log in using their email, favorite social media network, or Gmail account—fast and common ways of doing it.

In summary, digital punch cards are an effective strategy for building and maintaining a strong connection with customers, creating a win-win relationship.

Want to try a punch card created with Easypromos? Here’s an example of a digital punch card with purchase receipt validation requirement:

Customize your digital punch card with your brand and options

Design possibilities

No programming skills are necessary to create your punch card. Easypromos provides the tools to customize the card with your images, colors, and elements. Our design kit allows you to create a fully responsive microsite with a personalized design featuring your brand imagery.

Moreover, you can configure the image of the validation box, both the initial “blank” one and the image with the stamped, validated box. This way, the user can see the progress on their stamp card.

Number of boxes to validate

Configure the number of boxes that users have to validate to obtain the prize or reward. We recommend that your punch card has between 6 and 12 boxes to validate. However, this number depends on your goals and your type of business. Using the tool, you can enable up to 20 stamps. For instance, if your business is a hair salon and your clients visit once a month, a card with 6 or 8 boxes may be enough so that the action does not extend too long, and users feel rewarded.

Automatic prize redemption upon completion of the card

You can manage the rewards to give them away automatically when a customer validates all the boxes on the punch card. After validating the last box, a window with the prize and usage or redemption instructions will pop up. The platform can detect if the user has validated the necessary boxes to receive the prize if you preconfigure it to do so when designing the card.

If you provide the prize directly upon completing the card, you can use Easypromos’ coupon and code distribution system. For instance, you can give a discount coupon or a voucher that appears directly on the final page. The user can then redeem it at your establishment using your own validation system.

You also have the option to receive an email notification each time a customer completes the card, allowing you to manually process the reward using your own system.

Automatic email system

With Easypromos, you can establish periodic and automated communication with customers who use your digital punch card. Set up emails to communicate the number of validations and encourage them to make a purchase soon. You can also send an automatic email upon validating each box to confirm that the validation has been done successfully, send prize information when the card is completed, and more.

How to validate each box in the digital punch card

There are several ways to validate purchases on physical loyalty cards, and not all of them are very reliable. Some involve stamping a box each time the customer makes a purchase, while others require punching a hole in each box or placing a sticker to complete the grid. Once completed, the customer can redeem the card for a prize, discount, or benefit at the point of sale.

In the digital realm, this dynamic is very similar, although customers validate the boxes themselves after completing an action or requirement. Additionally, it allows for more reliable methods to prevent fraud and unethical practices. There are three ways to stamp the boxes on a digital punch card:

Requesting a validation code

After a purchase or using a service, the customer receives a receipt with a unique promotional code to redeem on the punch card. The receipt may contain a QR code with the URL of the card to remind and facilitate access to their digital card. You can see an example in the following image:

This requires printing cards or receipts with the codes. These codes are preloaded to the punch card app and the platform verifies them before validating the box on the user’s punch card. Try this demo to get a feel of the user experience for this type of validation.

Validating a purchase receipt

After making a minimum purchase, the customer uploads a photo of the purchase receipt to validate a box on the punch card. In this case, the application will automatically verify the receipt using Optical Character Recognition (OCR). To ensure customers have quick access to their digital card, the store can provide the QR code of the card at the point of sale, in the private customer area of the website, or even send it via email or messaging so customers find it easily. Try out the experience of stamping a box with a purchase receipt in this DEMO.

With a QR code provided by the establishment

Another way to validate the box is by scanning a QR code. In this case, the store displays a QR code that serves as a key for each box or a dynamic QR code (the QR code can be automatically regenerated after each scan to prevent fraud). When making a purchase, customers access the microsite, identify themselves, and validate the box by scanning the QR code provided by the shop attendant. Try our digital stamp card DEMO with QR code validation.

Conclusion

Satisfied customers make repeat purchases, and in the long run, they are more profitable for the brand because there is no need to invest in catching their attention again. Additionally, being familiar with the product, they tend to spend more on each purchase and often recommend your products. That’s why using punch cards is a winning strategy for your brand, as it allows you to satisfy your customers and achieve recurring sales.

Don’t miss out on the opportunity and contact us to create a digital punch card! This type of dynamic is ideal for any kind of business: clothing stores, fitness centers, cafés, supermarkets, restaurants, grocery stores, franchises, hair salons, stationery and tobacco shops, furniture stores, and more. Contact us, and we’ll provide you with a personalized DEMO so you can see how easy it is to create your digital punch card.

Secure and respectful audience data gathering (zero-party data and first-party data) will be more critical than ever. As we’ve emphasized at Easypromos, privacy and security will become the core of the relationship between brands and users.

So, without further ado, here are the six key aspects that will define trends in interactive marketing for 2024, providing a comprehensive and strategic vision to boost your brand in this new landscape.

1. Promotions with Impeccable Privacy

Since the implementation of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), awareness of user privacy rights has significantly increased in Europe. Furthermore, many other countries have developed similar data protection and management policies. However, in 2024, the security and privacy of participants’ data will become central and indispensable for all brands. Defined as Privacy-Centric Marketing, it will be essential to safeguard the reputation and credibility of brands.

Transparent data collection, handling it securely, and obtaining users’ consent is crucial. This poses a challenge for many brands operating in the digital sphere, especially when they need to gather data directly from users interested in their products or services. Promotions, such as giveaways, surveys, and games, will be ideal tools for this process. Easypromos enables brands to properly present the privacy policy during lead generation, provide checkboxes to communicate the use or purpose of collecting personal data, and obtain confirmation from participants in compliance with regulations.

2. First-Hand Contact Data in Exchange for Prizes

Starting in 2024, Google will progressively phase out third-party cookies. This makes it more important for brands to develop their databases with users genuinely interested in their products, focusing on obtaining first-party data and data provided directly by users (Zero-party data). To acquire this data, brands will need to offer attractive incentives and rewards since users won’t share their personal information without receiving something in return. This strategy is essential to establish a direct relationship between brands and their audience.

In the process of collecting and storing this data, it’s crucial to integrate lead generation platforms like Easypromos with other common marketing tools. It’s not just about collecting contact information; it’s also necessary to store, analyze, and segment this data using tools such as Customer Relationship Management (CRM). Additionally, it’s important to maintain this relationship by sending relevant content and strictly adhering to user privacy and data protection regulations.

3. Loyalty-building actions for customers

Currently, it’s easy for brands to create exclusive digital promotions for customers. Promotions can be organized where users validate their purchase receipt before participating. Tools like Easypromos can automatically verify these receipts and grant access to the promotion. Using Optical Character Recognition (OCR) and code validation technologies, organizing brands can offer promotions that reward buyers, even without an established loyalty program.

Brands are increasingly using exclusive giveaways, games, and other gamified activities to foster loyalty among their customers. These strategies not only increase the average purchase amount by incentivizing customers to buy more and repeat their purchases but also help gather customer data and interact with them to promote other campaigns.

For brands that already have loyalty programs, there’s a growing trend to use exclusive and gamified promotions to maintain user interest. These brands can offer periodic promotions to customers on their club’s intranet or who have downloaded their application. Integration with platforms like Easypromos allows them to execute fully personalized interactive actions with minimal investment in time and resources.

4. TikTok becomes relevant for brands

This social network has been evolving and growing significantly among users. But it was last year that it started becoming relevant for brands, among other reasons, due to its broad and diverse audience and the new marketing tools that TikTok Business has made available to companies.

In 2024, brands will increase their use of TikTok, although the possibilities for generating interactive promotions within the social network are still very limited. Brands can use ads to launch digital promotions and funnel participants to a microsite where they can participate in exchange for providing their contact details. This way, the social network becomes a channel to impact users while giving the brand ownership of the audience.

5. UGC Contests, customers turned brand ambassadors

For some time, customer reviews, opinions, and recommendations have gained importance regarding brands’ visibility and credibility. Moreover, it’s common for consumers to use social media to share photos and videos showcasing the products and services they use. Users generate content to explain both good and bad experiences. Meanwhile, brands attempt to capitalize on this content by organizing contests and giveaways for the ambassadors of their products. These are some strategies forecasted to grow:

1. Giveaways and contests among consumers who share their product experience.
2. Contests and rewards for influencers and content creators collaborating with the brand.

6. Verified emails, the key to your email marketing

Email marketing remains relevant as a priority channel for achieving marketing goals in 2024 for several reasons:

• It’s an effective channel for working with proprietary databases.
• Its cost is affordable compared to other channels.
• Email user identification remains reliable.

Digital promotions allow obtaining reliable and verified email addresses, facilitating the creation of effective email marketing campaigns. As a matter of fact, the system of participant identification and communication via email is replacing other indirect acquisition channels like social media logins, which have less up-to-date data.

This has been a natural process, paired with reinforced and updated security and fraud control systems. If brands trust the contact data obtained via promotions, these must be reliable and verified. Every data acquisition platform must have anti-fraud control systems and a security team that reviews that the campaign is working properly. Only then will email marketing campaigns maintain their effectiveness.

And, of course, the trend to incorporate Artificial Intelligence into digital campaign processes to enhance creativity and optimize time. At Easypromos we will continue to keep an eye on which other aspects on our end can be improved using AI.

Being chosen as the most voted in a category not only means recognition for quality, innovation, and service but can also become a competitive advantage.

A differential and highly valued point is that these contests offer the organizer an excellent opportunity for monetization through sponsorship. For this reason, many ‘best of the best‘ contests are organized by media outlets such as magazines, newspapers, or radio stations as they can leverage their sales team to sell more advertising space.

The best alternative to create a ‘Best of’ contest is the Online Voting Contest app. With it, you can boost participation and interaction easily and in an organized manner. Keep on reading to learn how you can manage these contests with Easypromos and the strategies to generate revenue with them.

Introduction: Selection of Candidates

As organizers of a ‘Best of’ type contest, the first consideration is how to select the candidates. There are two options: with nominations and without nominations

With nominations

In this dynamic, users propose the candidates, and the organizers decide which of these move to the voting stage. In other words, before the voting process begins, there is a preliminary stage where users nominate their favorite in each category. After receiving all the proposals, the organizer reviews them and selects the final candidates to compete for the votes.

Nominations can be open, allowing users to propose any candidate or be limited to a predefined group of candidates. Open nominations require more time and effort from organizers since they have to review the suggestions and make the final selection.

Without nominations

In this contest format, the organizer determines the candidates, skipping any preliminary nomination stage by users. Participants go directly to vote among a preselected set of candidates in various categories. This methodology allows for stricter control over the competing candidates and provides a more agile and direct start to the voting process, without the need for an extensive review and selection period for nominees.

Easypromos allows you to manage both contest formats, with nominations or without nominations. Additionally, it provides the necessary tools so that, in the case of nominations, all received proposals can be downloaded and analyzed.

Anatomy of a candidate

When the public suggests nominees, they usually only provide basic information, such as the candidate’s name. For example, if someone wants to nominate the best Italian restaurant in the city, they would only write ‘Pizzeria Mario’. However, when it’s the organizers who add a candidate, they typically include more comprehensive details. Following the same example, the organizer wouldn’t just mention the restaurant’s name but would also include its address and logo.

With Easypromos, a candidate’s profile can be complemented with the following information:

• Name.
• Short description.
• Profile image to go along with the candidate’s name.
• Country.
• External link, e.g. link to their website.
• Links to the candidate’s social media.
• Multimedia content: Image, video, texts, and PDF files.

The goal is to provide a complete profile of the candidate. As we’ll see later, one monetization avenue will be to offer ‘premium profiles’ for candidates to stand out among their competitors.

Get a feel of the user experience with this Best of the Best contest DEMO and discover all its possibilities.

Vote Management

Voters’ registration

In a public voting contest, identifying voters is crucial. With Easypromos, users have to complete a registration process to be able to vote. The first time a user votes, the system will prompt them to fill out a registration form. On the same registration screen, they will accept the contest’s terms, privacy policy, and consent to be incorporated into the organizer’s database. Once the registration is completed, they can vote throughout the contest duration without having to register again; the system will only ask for login details. The login can be by email, mobile phone (with SMS validation), or through social login: Google, Facebook, or X (Twitter). The contest organizer will receive voters’ contact information, and if consent is given, they can incorporate it into their CRM or newsletter distribution systems.

Categories and Sections

Once the candidates have been selected, public voting galleries will be set up. With Easypromos, you can create as many categories and subcategories as needed. As seen in the example in the introduction, you can create categories like ‘Best Restaurant,’ ‘Best Tourist Attraction,’ ‘Best Cultural Event,’ among others. Managing multiple categories is particularly useful when there’s a wide range of participants grouped into different sections and categories. Organizing by categories simplifies navigation and user selection in the contest. Additionally, contest organizers can gather precise and well-segmented data on audience preferences.

Look & Feel

Depending on the number of categories, subcategories, and candidates, it might be better to go for a presentation rich in images or a more textual format. For example, if there are five categories, you can present each category with an image, but if there are 100 categories, it would be better to present them in a textual mode. The same applies to candidates; there is the option to show a complete profile for each candidate or display a list with the candidate’s name or title. Furthermore, as with the rest of Easypromos dynamics, the entire graphic aspect of the interface can be customized: fonts, colors, background, buttons, links, header, and footer.

Frequency and number of votes

One configuration decision the contest organizer must make is determining how many votes each voter gets and how often they can vote. The most common options are daily votes, weekly votes, or a total number of votes. Moreover, the voting system can be refined through advanced voting, where instead of giving a simple vote to a candidate, several points are allocated. For instance, giving 10 points to the favorite, 9 to the second, 8 to the third, and so on. Similar to the system used by Eurovision to distribute points among participating countries.

Fraud control

If you’ve browsed the Easypromos admin panel or our blog, you’ve probably seen that fraud control is one of our main concerns, and we’ve dedicated a lot of effort to R&D in this area. Simply speaking, with Easypromos, voting contests are protected from robots, automatic scripts, and users who use temporary email accounts. Furthermore, we maintain a database of malicious IPs and domains, making it extremely challenging for cheaters to interfere in your contest. Additionally, the Easypromos security center gives you total control over any unwanted access to your contest.

Voting Results

As the organizer, you can decide whether to show the voting results openly or not to publish the votes for each candidate. Once the voting period is over, the system allows you to award prizes to the most voted candidates, as well as to distribute prizes among all voters. Keep in mind that, beyond tallying the voting results, with Easypromos you can collect contact details from all the voters.

How to generate income with a “Best of…” contest

Sponsorship is the key to generating income in a ‘best of’ voting contest. There are several strategies you can implement to maximize the economic benefits of these events:

Sponsorship by categories and subcategories

Companies can sponsor specific categories such as ‘Best Restaurant,’ ‘Best Café,’ etc. This approach not only provides visibility to a relevant audience but also associates with the quality and prestige of being a sponsor of the ‘best of.’ Moreover, subcategories like ‘The best Mexican restaurant’ or ‘The best artisan bakery’ offer more specific and targeted sponsorship opportunities, which can be particularly attractive for local businesses or specialized brands.

Featured candidates

Another source of income comes from offering ‘premium profiles‘ to candidates. For a fee, a restaurant, a café, or any other participant can stand out in the voting with a more visual and attractive profile. These premium profiles can include features such as photos, videos, links, and other elements that make them stand out among standard candidates.

Are you looking to create a Best of the Best contest with fewer images or with a survey style? Try this DEMO and discover its possibilities.

Advertising and sponsored content

Apart from direct sponsorship of categories, you can generate income by selling advertising space on the website and in the contest’s promotional channels. This can include banners, mentions on social media, or even sponsored content that integrates with the contest theme, such as articles or videos about previous winners or trends in relevant categories.

Strategic partnerships

Establishing partnerships with media outlets and other platforms can increase the visibility of the contest and, consequently, its value for sponsors. For example, partnering with a local radio station or a popular blog could include cross-promotion and special coverage of the contest.

Data analysis and audience segmetation

An additional advantage for sponsors is access to data and analysis on audience preferences. With appropriate consent, you can offer sponsors valuable information about voting trends, user preferences, and demographics. This enables brands to refine their marketing strategies and better understand their target audience.

Events and cross promotion

Finally, consider organizing events related to the contest, such as award ceremonies or tasting events with the highlighted candidates. These events can be another source of income through ticket sales, additional sponsorships, and cross-promotion.

Conclusion

In summary, ‘best of’ contests are not only an excellent way to engage and excite your audience but also represent a significant opportunity to generate income. With the aforementioned monetization strategies, you can turn these contests into lucrative and stimulating events for both participants and sponsors.

If you’re interested in exploring the potential of these contests, we recommend you experiment with Easypromos. You can start by creating an account for free, allowing you to design, customize, and test your contest at no cost. This way, you can familiarize yourself with the tool and discover how it can adapt to your specific needs.

Feel free to contact the Easypromos team to clarify any doubts or if you desire a personalized demo. Dare to discover the power of ‘best of’ contests with Easypromos!

In this article, we will delve into the features and advantages of creating and launching a Word Shuffle game using the Easypromos platform and will take a look at some real-life examples of successful promotions.

How does Word Shuffle work?

The principle of the game is quite straightforward: players have to place the letters presented to them in the right order to reveal the hidden word or phrase within the allotted time.

With Easypromos, creating a digital Word Shuffle game has never been easier. You might think that the most time-consuming aspect of creating the game would be coming up with the words and clues. Maybe not if you plan to only include 5 words in the game, but as the number of words to include grows, so does the time and effort required. Well, not quite! The Easypromos promotion editor incorporates an AI tool that will automatically generate the words and clues. All you have to do is indicate the language, the topic, and how many questions you want. The AI tool will then generate the questions and all you have to do is choose the ones you want to include. It’s that Easy!

Define the format of the clue

The words generated by the AI tool will include a written clue for the players, which you can edit if you wish to. However, if you want to make the game more visual, say to include images of your products, you can upload an image to serve as a clue instead of a written one. Want to mix it up and use written and visual clues? You can do that too!

How many words can be uploaded?

The editor allows you to upload up to 500 words and the game itself can include from one to 25 randomly chosen words per game. However, to provide a positive playing experience, we recommend including between 3 and 10 words per game.

Prize Distribution

Games are fun, and that’s why people play them. But for a gamified promotional action to be truly successful, entertainment alone is simply not enough. And this is where prizes and the way you distribute them comes into play. Firstly, choose a prize, or prizes, that are both attractive and relevant to your target audience. Secondly, define how those prizes will be given away. Easypromos offers a wide variety of prize distribution strategies. Here are a few ideas:

• The top-ranked players get a prize
• A final prize draw is carried out among the X top-ranked players
• All registered players enter a final prize draw
• Or a combination of all of the above!

Get a feel of the user experience with this Valentine’s Word Shuffle demo.

Word Shuffle game to reward your audience and build loyalty

Membership and loyalty programs offer numerous advantages for both brands and customers. For brands, they drive customer retention, boost revenue, offer valuable consumer insights, and encourage brand advocacy. On the other hand, customers enjoy exclusive discounts or personalized offers, but most importantly a sense of belonging within a community. Add a little fun to the chance of winning a prize with an entertaining and engaging game, and success is guaranteed!

In the example above, the Alumni Association of the University of Kentucky wanted to show its members its appreciation and reward them with the possibility of winning a prize, whilst entertaining and challenging them with a Word Shuffle game. Players simply had to fill out the registration form to play the game and enter the final prize draw. The lucky winner got a Keeneland Racecourse Prize Pack that included tickets to an exclusive VIP room.

Word Shuffle to promote your product offer

Product promotion and brand recall are two essentials of any marketing strategy. Brands are constantly in search of new strategies to implement them and gamified promotional actions are now a consolidated trend.

Take a look at this promotion launched by the Silken Hotel chain in Spain. The brand launched a Word Shuffle game in which players had to guess the names of the cities where that chain has hotels. With this action, the organizers not only promoted their establishments in a fun manner but also made sure that their audience knew in which Spanish cities they had a presence.

Educate your audience on your product or brand with a Word Shuffle game

Velvet MGL is a chocolate and patisserie shop in the Spanish city of Tarragona that offers a unique and high-quality product. The shop launched a Word Shuffle game to promote its product offering and to educate its audience on aspects ranging from their shop’s location to the source of their chocolate.

The shop communicated the promotion on all their social media accounts and fostered competitiveness, and therefore engagement, by rewarding the ten fastest players with a prize.

In the following example, the South African gym chain Edge launched a promotion giving participants a chance to win from a one-day pass to a full year’s membership to their fitness centers. Players had to register for the promotion and unscramble a series of words related to health and fitness.

Raise awareness with a Word Shuffle game

La Rioja Recicla is a public initiative that aims to educate the population of the autonomous community of La Rioja in Spain, on recycling and its benefits. As part of their campaign to educate and raise awareness, the organization launched a Word Shuffle game that included educational content. Additionally, users who registered and played entered a final prize draw for the chance to win one of three Spanish cured hams.

So now you know. If you’re looking for a gamified promotion to promote your brand that is both fun and engaging, customizable, and easy to set up and manage, the Easypromos Word Shuffle app ticks all the boxes.

We hope you find this article useful and inspiring. If you have any doubts or questions don’t hesitate to contact us via live-chat. We will be happy to help.

To ensure coupons help your brand and products become more sellable without a perceived devaluation of their price, it is important to ask the customer for something in return. For example, in the following case, the furniture brand Moradillo gave away 20% discount coupons, but did so within specific guidelines:

• A significant reason: celebrating their 50th anniversary. A distinct, special, and time-limited offer.
• A nominal, non-transferable discount. In exchange for their contact details, users received a coupon with a unique code that can only be used once.

The Easypromos tools make it possible to create personalized coupons and distribute them efficiently and securely. Additionally, you can clearly explain the instructions for redemption and track who uses it, when, and at which establishment.

Here’s another example of coupons distributed using Easypromos. The Montigalá shopping center distributed 2×1 coupons for its stores using the Promo Codes and Coupons app. The brand designed an online coupon that users could download and redeem at the store.

With Easypromos, you can create personalized coupons to make them match your corporate image. In the following example, a water park distributed 20% discount coupons to everyone who registered at the promotion’s microsite. Upon completing the registration, users could download a PDF coupon with a unique barcode and redeem it at the park’s ticket booths when purchasing the entrance ticket.

E-commerce coupon examples

Coupons are also effective to encourage online purchases. In the next example, a toy brand aiming to boost its online sales delivered a fun dynamic to attract followers: a digital puzzle. As users completed the game, they received a discount coupon that could only be redeemed in their online store.

Electronic coupons to redeem at e-commerce are usually of two types:

• A generic alphanumeric coupon, valid for anyone who uses it and restricted only by the expiration date. In this case, the brand does not need to limit its use because it always results in a sale, and has made sure that its profit margin is not affected.
• A unique alphanumeric coupon code for each user. It can only be used once and by a single person.

E-commerce platforms typically have a system for generating promotional codes. In this case, the Easypromos tools can be used to distribute them but are ont involved in validating the coupon within the online store.

Another example of coupons to redeem in an online store is the prize and discount roulette of the brand Ufesa. To direct their social media followers to their e-commerce, they launched an online roulette and shared it on several channels. Users could register on the microsite and spin the roulette for the chance to win prizes. Most were discount coupons to redeem in their online store, consisting of a generic code: SORPRESA10.

Gamifying the distribution of coupons is a good option to capture your audience’s attention and create a more positive connection. Let’s take a look at several ways of using coupon-based gamification to achieve your marketing goals.

Examples of gamified coupon distribution

A digital prize prize wheel is a kind of interactive promotion that generates a strong response from participants. It is easy and straightforward for the user, and the element of chance is always enticing.

In the following example, a pizzeria launched a ‘prize-no prize’ Halloween prize wheel. If users landed on a prize square, they received a 20% discount to redeem at the physical store.

Another popular gamified dynamic used to distribute coupons is a digital scratch-and-win. Traditional promotions of physically scratching a card to find out if you win a prize have moved to the online world, allowing for increased interest and surprise.

In the example above, an Economics newspaper in India used a scratch-and-win promotion during the Diwali festival to distribute coupons. They presented a banner with a link to the promotion’s microsite, allowing them to identify anonymous website visits and convert them into leads. In return, users got discounts to access paid content.

Coupons provide a double incentive to participate in games that brands share with their audience to generate engagement and brand awareness. In the following example, an electronics store chain introduced the new Samsung phones to its customers with a puzzle. Those who completed the game earned prizes and advantages in the store, as shown in the following example, consisting of a 10% discount coupon for repair services.

Other examples of coupon distribution dynamics

There are many options to distribute valuable coupons among your target audience. The digital world allows you to organize interactive promotions like this summer photo contest. The air freshener and cosmetics brand, The Fruit Company launched a photo contest and rewarded all participants with a discount coupon for their online store.

Last but not least, here’s an advanced example of how to use coupons to increase purchases: the Digital Coupon Book. If you wish to promote a shopping center, a business association, or a tourist area, you need a tool to deliver discounts and advantages attractively, consistently, and collectively. This way, you can increase customer attraction with a comprehensive offer.

With Easypromos, creating and distributing digital coupons has never been so simple and effective. Whether you want to boost sales in your physical store or e-commerce, coupons allow you to instantly reward your customers in line with your brand’s style. From online redeemable electronic coupons to in-store coupons redeemable at the point of sale, Easypromos has the perfect solution for you.

This guide will provide you with a comprehensive overview of how to create, customize, and distribute digital coupons with Easypromos.

Main features of Easypromos’ Coupons

A coupon is a digital document or code that allows holders to obtain a discount or benefit when purchasing a product or service. Companies use coupons as a marketing tool to encourage purchases, attract new customers, retain existing ones, or promote a specific product or service.

Coupons manages or generated with the Easypromos platform have the following main features::

• Unique alphanumeric codes: In most cases, coupons consist of unique alphanumeric codes distributed among users. Easypromos can manage various delivery methods, from providing the same code to all participants to handling promotions with millions of different codes.
• QR code or barcode format: In addition to alphanumeric codes, Easypromos offers the option to display the code in QR code or barcode format. The following formats are supported: EAN-13, CODE 128, and CODE 39.
• Unit control: With Easypromos, you have the capability of determining the quantity of units that will be distributed for each coupon. In the case of coupons linked to physical prizes, the number of units is usually limited. However, for coupons linked to discounts, the campaign administrator has the option to not set a limit on the potential number of coupons that can be distributed.
• Expiration date management: Possibility of assigning an expiration date to coupons. This date can be specific, or to create a sense of urgency, a relative expiration date can be set based on the moment the coupon was delivered. For example: ‘You have 15 minutes to claim your free drink.’
• Personalized PDFs creation: Each coupon can include a personalized PDF with dynamic information about the coupon holder. We will cover this in detail later in this guide.
• Instructions and download options: With Easypromos, you can configure usage instructions and coupon download options to guide the user through the redemption process.
• Prize redemption tool: Allows for quick and secure code verification at the point of sale through a comprehensive prize redemption tool that supports two redemption methods. We will dedicate a specific section of the guide to this point.
• User-data collection: Easypromos dynamics where coupons are distributed require users to fill out a registration form, which can be fully customized. This provides valuable data that can be used to better understand your audience.
• Automated email delivery: Coupons can be sent to users via email, Easypromos provides a platform to send personalized transactional emails automatically as soon as a user has obtained the coupon.
• Comprehensive reporting: Easypromos offers reports and statistics that allow you to see how coupons are distributed and redeemed. The administrator can download Excel reports to find out who obtained a coupon and, if the coupons have a redemption system, how many have been used, and where.

Types of coupons

Easypromos offers two main types of coupons, each one has their own advantages and is more appropriate for specific scenarios.

A. E-Coupons (digital prizes):

• Alphanumeric codes that clients can redeem during their shopping process in your e-commerce.
• They can be unique and individual codes for each customer or a single code for all customers. E.g.: XmasDiscount20%
• The most common process would involve creating your own discount codes for your e-commerce (Shopify, Magento, Woocommerce, etc) and copy-paste these codes to your Easypromos promotion to be distributed among your customers.
• E-coupons can also consist of codes associated with gift cards from Amazon. Shopify, Netflix, or any other gift card system.

B. Point-of-sale Coupons (physical prizes):

• In-store coupons are vouchers (sometimes also referred to as ‘vouchers’) that customers can redeem for products or services at a physical establishment. These coupons can be presented digitally on a mobile device or printed.
• These coupons represent the digital evolution of traditional discount vouchers, but instead of being printed on paper, they are digital.
• They can be redeemed in physical stores by showing the coupon information on the mobile device or printing the coupon.
• They are ideal for promotions where you want participants to visit the store to redeem the prize.
• Since they require in-person interaction to be redeemed, in-store coupons can provide valuable data about customer preferences and behaviors in the store.

Boost sales and increase foot traffic to your points of sale with digital coupons and redeemable prizes. Create you coupons easily and automatically with the coupon app.

Coupon redemption methods

Redemption methods determine how customers can use coupons to claim offers or prizes. Easypromos offers redemption methods that are suitable for both physical and digital environments. Let’s see how they work:

A. Physical point-of-sale redemption

Coupons can be redeemed at the physical point-of-sale in the following ways:

A.1 Canjeo mostrando el móvil Mobile phone redemption

• Customers show the coupon on their mobile phones to the staff in the shop.
• Users use the redemption slider function on their phone.
• Once verified, the prize is handed over to the user and the corresponding digital voucher cannot be used again.
• The main advantage of this method is that it keeps the interaction time between staff and customers to a minimum.
• Coupons are displayed on a screen with a countdown and a sliding button that prevents making screenshots so that the coupon can be used repeatedly.
• This redemption method is ideal for establishments with high levels of sales activity. For example, fast-food shops that reward customers with free sodas or fries.

A.2 QR code scan redemption using the Easypromos validation portal

• For this option, the Easypromos validation portal comes into play. It consists of a tool that keeps track of all validated coupons in real-time.
• The user shows a coupon with a QR code on it.
• The staff in the shop scans the QR code and the system checks on the spot that the coupon hasn’t been used before and validates it.
• It is not necessary to download any app to validate the QR code coupon as it is scanned using a mobile phone camera.
• If, for any reason, the code cannot be scanned, the coupon’s code can be entered manually in the system.

In both cases, since the entire distribution and redemption process is carried out through the Easypromos platform, we guarantee that the coupons can only be redeemed once, and we provide comprehensive information about when and where each coupon has been redeemed.

A.3 Redemption through the client’s own coupon validation system

• There are scenarios where customers already have their own coupon validation system and use Easypromos solely for coupon distribution.
• In this context, coupons distributed through Easypromos can be associated with an alphanumeric code, a QR code, or a barcode, depending on what the customer’s validation system accepts.
• If QR codes or barcodes are used, the customer’s store employees can scan the coupons using the same barcode reader on their POS system, or alternatively, enter the alphanumeric code of the coupon directly into the POS system.
• If the customer’s validation system is used, the analysis of the distributed codes versus the redeemed codes will have to be done by combining the information from Easypromos with the information from the customer’s system.

B. Redemption on a digital platform or e-commerce

Digital coupons can be redeemed on digital platforms through a simple process:

• In the case of digital coupons, Easypromos’ role is limited to the coupon delivery; the core redemption process is carried out either on the client’s e-commerce platform or the platform associated with the gift card.
• Customers enter the unique coupon code in the appropriate field during the checkout process on the e-commerce website or the corresponding digital platform (such as Amazon, Spotify, etc.).
• Once entered, the client’s system automatically validates the coupon code to ensure it is legitimate and has not been used previously.

Customized PDFs linked to a digital coupon

Many consumers still value the familiar feeling of a printed coupon in hand. At Easypromos, we have found an elegant way to merge the best of both worlds: by associating a downloadable and fully customized PDF with digital coupons. This practice reduces the mental gap between the traditional offline coupon and the modern online coupon, providing a smooth transition that respects users’ preference for something tangible.

When creating a coupon in Easypromos, there is the option to enable downloadable content so that users can download the coupon in PDF format and receive it by email. Here’s how it works:

• Automatic PDF Generation: Easypromos can automatically generate a PDF of the coupon. This PDF will include the unique alphanumeric coupon code, making redemption easy both online and in physical stores.
• Full Customization: The PDF can include various graphical elements such as text, images, and visual separators. This allows the creation of an attractive and functional design that highlights the coupon’s important details.
• Validation QR Code: A validation QR code can also be included in the PDF, making it easier to redeem the coupon at the point of sale.
• Drag & Drop: The distribution of text and graphic elements in the PDF can be easily customized using a convenient drag-and-drop system.
• Use of Variables: Dynamic variables can be included in the PDF, such as the name and last name of the person who has won the coupon.
• Email Delivery: Once personalized, the PDF can be automatically emailed to users who have got a coupon.
• Custom PDFs: Easypromos also supports the import of external PDFs. The most common case being uploading numbered concert tickets. In other words, the user receives the original concert ticket directly.

PDF customization provides an effective way to maintain a connection with the offline world, offering customers a flexible and satisfying redemption experience. Creating customized coupons ensures that every aspect of the coupon reflects your brand’s identity, adding coherence to the entire promotional campaign.

Ways to distribute coupons

The coupon distribution functionality is universal across all Easypromos dynamics, meaning any promotion, giveaway, contest, or game in Easypromos can incorporate coupons as prizes.

This section provides a summary of the most common practices, but we recommend visiting the Easypromos applications catalog for up-to-date and extensive information on all our products.

• Registration Form: A coupon is delivered in exchange for users leaving their contact information. It’s the most direct and straightforward dynamic. As mentioned at the beginning of this guide, statistics show that over 70% of shoppers would be willing to fill out a registration form in exchange for a 20% discount coupon. A universal rule is that the higher the perceived value of the coupon, the more information we can ask from the user without the risk of them leaving the process halfway.
• Mass Email to a User List: If you want to reward users you already have contact with, whether they are customers or newsletter subscribers, this method is ideal. You simply need to upload a file with user data to Easypromos, and from there, you can send an email to each user with a unique coupon. For example, if you have a food delivery service, you can offer a discount to all those who placed an order within the last week. Both the coupon and the email can include user information for a fully personalized experience.
• Direct Prize Dynamics: One of the most fun ways to distribute prizes is through classic dynamics like a Prize Wheel’ or a Scratch and Win digital scratchcard. Any of the prizes assigned in these dynamics can be coupons. Distributing coupons through direct prize dynamics not only rewards users, but also creates a memorable and positive association with your brand.
• Interactive Games: In recent years, it has become clear that simple interactive games like puzzles, word searches, or quizzes significantly increase user engagement, especially when a global ranking with participant scores is displayed. In Easypromos, you can tailor the distribution of coupons based on user performance in these games. For example, a high score in a trivia game could result in a coupon with a more significant discount. This strategy not only introduces a fun element, but also encourages effort and active participation, making the distribution of coupons a more rewarding and personalized experience.
• Discount or Coupon Book: With Easypromos you can create a Coupon Book, a multi-stage promotion where you group several discounts so that users can easily explore the offers. For example, you can have sections for discounts on new products and others for popular products. Users navigate the directory, choosing the coupons that interest them. This strategy enriches the user experience, highlights different product categories, and encourages loyalty by allowing users to come back and discover new offers.
• User-Generated Content (UGC) Contests: Combining user-generated content contests with the delivery of discount coupons is an effective tactic to reward participation. For example, in a photo contest where the grand prize could be a trip to New York, you can offer discount coupons to all participants simply for entering the contest. This tactic not only incentivizes participation, but also values the time and effort of each participant. Therefore, creating a positive and lasting relationship between them and your brand.
• Offline Coupons: Yet another possibility is that the client distributes coupons in a more traditional way. I.e., code printed in a brochure, flyers, or a physical coupon booklet. 

Easypromos allows you to use its validation portal to verify these codes, even if they weren’t distributed through a registration form in Easypromos. The client simply uploads the coupon codes to Easypromos, and through the validation portal, can track how many codes have been redeemed and at which establishments the redemptions were made.

Conclusions

The digital world has redefined the way we interact with customers, and digital coupons have become an essential tool in this interaction. Throughout this guide, we have explored how Easypromos makes it easy to create, distribute, and manage digital coupons. Thus, enabling brands to connect with their audiences effectively and creatively. The possibilities are almost limitless, and the various distribution and customization methods offered by Easypromos make coupon delivery an enriching experience for both businesses and users.

Infographic, types of digital coupons

If you have any questions or would like to see Easypromos in action, our sales team is here to help you. Please don’t hesitate to contact us to explore all the solutions that the platform has to offer to help you achieve your marketing goals.

In this article, we will get into the two major questions regarding Door Prizes: When to hold them, and how to organize and manage them.

As we’ve mentioned before, Door Prizes are giveaways that take place during events in which all attendees stand a chance to win a prize by the mere fact that they walked into the event. So, the first logical question would be, which kinds of events are the most suitable to hold a Door Prize giveaway? 

When to celebrate Door Prizes?

If there is one thing that all events have in common, is that they bring together people with a shared interest. Whether it be professional interest, education, or even a hobby, this common ground among attendees provides the perfect opportunity to generate engagement, boost brand awareness, promote and sell products or services, and the list goes on. So with this in mind, let’s take a look at what kind of events provide the perfect setting for Door Prizes.

Door Prizes at Trade Shows and Expos

These events bring together industry professionals and potential customers. Offering a door prize can encourage people to visit your booth, engage with your products or services, and provide you with an opportunity to gather leads. Tip: Keep signing up to the giveaway simple and fast and configure the registration form to include the information you need to collect. As a rule of thumb, name, company, and professional email address should be enough. Provide a tablet for visitors to sign up, or if you expect high traffic volume, display a QR code that visitors can scan to access the registration form and sign up. 

The example above shows a digital prize wheel that Gigamon launched to promote its products and draw visitors to its stand during the Interface Trade Show held in Seattle.

Want to learn more about digital prize wheels and their advantages? Here are six steps to create a successful Spin the Wheel promotion.

Door Prizes at Product Launches

If you’re introducing a new product to the market, a door prize giveaway can create buzz and anticipation around the launch. Depending on the nature of your product, you could offer some units as a prize, giving attendees a chance to experience the product firsthand. If attendance to the launch is by invite, make sure to include a link to the giveaway registration in the invitation and a description of the prize to incentivize participation. 

Door Prizes at Conferences and Seminars

Door prizes can incentivize attendance at educational or professional development events. A Door Prize promotion will make the event more appealing and reward participants for their time. You can include an invitation with a QR code to register for the giveaway in the welcome pack and also display it around the event venue. Make sure the time and day of the prize draw are clearly stated to ensure attendance. 

Door Prizes at Company anniversaries or celebrations

Whether you are celebrating an anniversary, a Christmas dinner, or a company’s picnic, including a door giveaway as part of your event is the perfect way to show your appreciation for your team and could very well be the highlight of the celebration.

Door Prizes at Online Events and Webinars

Virtual events can also incorporate door prize giveaways to increase attendance and engagement. Participants can enter the giveaway when signing up for the online event.

Now that we’ve gone over some examples of when Door Prizes can be held, it’s time we get into what might be the most important consideration: Which tools to use and how to carry it out. 

Choose the right tool to run your Door Prizes

As we mentioned before, the days of selecting winners by picking pieces of paper out of a bowl should be but a memory of days long gone. If the whole point of having Door Prizes is to promote your brand or product, then the most sensible thing is to do it using a reliable and trustworthy platform that will give your promotion the professional and fair feel that it deserves. Not to mention, making it easier for you to organize and carry out. No pen, no papers, no bowls, no scissors needed!

Easypromos offers a variety of giveaway apps, each one with a specific objective and scenario in mind but in this article we will only go over the most relevant ones for Door Prizes. 

Event Giveaway App

The Easypromos Event Giveaway app is ideal for conferences and presentations where there is a captive audience. Engage your audience by letting them know that there will be a quiz, or a survey, at the end of the conference or presentation and that those who answer correctly could win a prize. To participate, users access the URL or scan the QR code on the screen with their phones and answer the questions before time runs out. Once the time is up, a random prize draw is carried out to select the winners. 

List Giveaway App

If you wish to include a wider audience, for example the entirety of attendees to a trade show or event that requires a previous registration, the List Giveaway App is the solution. It’s simple and does not require any further action from participants. Use the Easypromos List Giveaway app to directly upload the list of participants from an Excel, CSV, or text file. This is an ideal dynamic for the closing of an event as it encourages attendees to stay until the end. Or to give away prizes at the dinner gala of a trade show. 

Entry Form Giveaway App

If your aim is to generate leads or gather information about the attendees to your event or trade show, or attract them to your company’s stand, the Entry Form Giveaway app will do the trick. Display a QR code at your stand for participants to register, include it in your welcome pack brochure, or include a link to it in the event’s registration confirmation email. Make sure you inform when the prize draw will take place to draw traffic to your stand. 

Promote your event on Social Media with an Instagram Stories Giveaway

GIve your event a Social Media boost with an Instagram Stories Giveaway. Ask attendees to post an Instagram story of them at your event or booth with a mention to your brand or your event’s Instagram profile. Then use the Easypromos Instagram Stories Giveaway app to carry out a fully automatic prize draw.

Announce the winners of your Door Prizes in style

A door prize may very well be the highlight of you event. So, make sure you do it in style with the Easypromos Showmode feature. This characteristic, available in all of our giveaway apps, allows you to create a fully customized video to announce the winners.

We hope you find these ideas interesting and helpful to include a Door Prize Giveaway in your next event. And if you have any questions or need more information about our platform, don’t hesitate to contact us via live chat. We will be happy to help!