Case Study: Home improvement sweepstakes generates $20K

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Home makeover promotions are a high performer for newspapers because they allow for a wide variety of advertisers to sponsor. Think about mattress retailers, lawn care specialists, contracting companies, and much more. Communities are very engaged in these types of promotions – anyone who enters their home will be sure to share it with their network – increasing the reach of the promotion.

  • The paper generated $20,000 in revenue from home improvement-related advertisers.
  • Over 1,600 participants opted in for email messaging.
  • Their third contest in 18 months and results continue to grow.

The idea
The Kansas City Star is a daily newspaper in Kansas City, Mo., with over one million daily subscribers. In addition to the newspaper, the staff also produces unique online content, magazines and newsletters. Every year they run consistently successful online promotions – so far in 2015, they've done sweepstakes giveaways for racing tickets, movie passes, trips to the botanical gardens and much more.

When they started running furniture giveaway contests a year ago, their big-picture goal was to engage their readers, develop their contact list and help their advertisers grow their databases. They wanted a contest that could easily integrate their multimedia capabilities to best achieve these objectives.

A sweepstakes giveaway was the perfect fit, because it allowed them to build new relationships with sponsors they had not worked with before, while still providing their veteran advertisers with real value. By running the promotion with four category exclusive sponsors, they ensured that each sponsor got attention and exposure without having to compete against other sponsors. Also, they ran it in the spring and fall – when advertisers in this category are active and looking for new ways to engage their audience.

Execution
They promoted the contest across a variety of platforms to reach the largest possible audience, and then turned those interactions into opt-ins for advertisers. Internal promotion was key – they ran weekly full-page and half-page ads in the Star, which connected their wide subscriber base with the sponsors. They also included banner ads on their website. Facebook promotions and optional Like boxes drove social media interaction with the sponsors.

They created a tab on the site titled "Contests," which was a dedicated platform to advertise the promotion. Similarly, their weekly contest newsletter continually kept the sweepstakes at the forefront of their readers' minds. In addition to the contest newsletter, they sent emails specifically highlighting the Home Improvement Giveaway. They find that, year after year, email is one of the most effective ways of reaching their subscribers.

Results
Overall, their advertisers were thrilled, and so was the paper. This contest is so successful that they actually run the Home Improvement Giveaway twice a year, in both the Spring and the Fall. Advertisers love this timing because they get to be in front of customers when people are thinking about making improvements to their home – during spring cleaning and right before the holidays.

This promotion generates $20,000 in revenue for the paper, and most recently led to more than 1,600 email opt-ins for their sponsors. Those opt-ins represent some of the most qualified leads they'll get all year.

Their multi-media promotions strategy also resulted in tangible growth for their sponsors' social media presence. As the results clearly indicate, they are definitely excited to expand on the sweepstakes this fall by broadening prize variety and incorporating more sponsors!

Matt Coen is the president and co-founder of Second Street, a leading provider of private-label online promotions platforms and partner success services for media companies based in St. Louis, Mo. He can be reached at (314) 880-4902 or matt@secondstreet.com.

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