How to Generate Valuable Leads Using Social Media Challenges

Social media challenges are becoming increasingly popular. The basic idea is to engage in an action while filming yourself, then upload it to social media so other people can see it and get inspired by it (or laugh at your pain if you fail.)

For years now, big brands have been getting impressive results using social media challenges, generating tons of new leads and converting them into customers. They are a great way to generate awareness around your small business and to boost engagement in your community. But, before you jump on the bandwagon, you need to have a powerful digital marketing strategy in place. Otherwise, you’ll just be wasting a lot of time, resources, and creative energy.

So, here are three things you need to consider to get it right.

• Make Them Relevant to Your Audience

From the banana peel challenge to the corn drill challenge, there are numerous viral trends taking the social media world by storm. As fun and appealing as they might seem, it doesn’t necessarily mean that they are a good fit for your small business. Sure, they might get you a lot of engagement, but prospects might get turned off if your social media strategy is not consistent with your brand’s message and vision.

That’s why it’s important to create social media challenges that speak to your audience’s interests. Find out their struggles and their pain points, and create a challenge around that. You want your challenge to solve a problem, not just to entertain. You want your audience to have something at the end, whether it’s a plan, a physical result, or a certain feeling.

• Keep It Short

How long should your social media challenge be? That is an important question, especially if you’re planning to use the challenge to generate new leads.

Nathalie Lussier and Robin Li, from ambitionally.com, discover that it’s hard for people to remain engaged with a challenge for longer than ten days. That’s why they and other social media marketers recommend putting together a challenge that’s between seven and 15 days.

Imagine you are a vegan meal delivery services who wants to generate buzz around your local business and acquire new leads. You decide to create a clean eating challenge to help prospects look and feel their best for summertime. Although you know that the effects of the challenge would be more visible after 30 days, the reality is that people on the Internet don’t have that much patience. So, you need to keep your challenge short and sweet – no more than two weeks – and create custom hashtags, social media posts, and videos to attract and engage prospects.

• Make Your Challenges Doable

Don’t overcomplicate your challenges or make your audience do too many things to get to the end. Just a few quick but effective steps are more than enough. Also, don’t shove your products in the face of your audience from the start. Make them go through a couple of steps before advertising your business.

Creating a social media challenges is going to take a lot of work. But, if you set them up correctly, you will generate new leads for your small business in no time.