There is a huge trend floating around many businesses on Facebook—giveaways, contests and promotions. This is a fun and interactive way to connect with your customers via social media, but there are a few rules you have to follow or you'll run the risk of getting the boot.
Many times businesses take the road of "do first, apologize later." But with Facebook, you are taking a risk of being reported for spam, inappropriate conduct and eventually left without a Facebook page that you spent time and possibly a little bit of money to cultivate. So here's a basic overview of what to do and what not to do when having Facebook giveaways, contests or promotions.
First, you want to make sure you have fully read the Facebook Promotion Guidelines. Facebook has outlined what they expect of you, the business and user, when promoting a contest on their social network. They also tell you what they mean by certain terms like "sweepstakes, giveaway, contest." It's important that you also take into consideration the FTC Advertising regulations on promotional giveaways, contests and promotions as well.
To be brief about it, Facebook does not want you to make your promotion seem like it's in any way affiliated with their social network. You cannot use their social features as a registration tool either. For example, you cannot run a Facebook contest that says "just like us on Facebook to be entered." That being said, you can have a contest form to sign up on your website that encourages people to like your page in order to hear about special announcements that pertain to the business and the business updates. You can encourage, but you cannot condition, the contest to include only people who like your Facebook page to be the winner.
Facebook also wants you to use a Facebook app to conduct the promotion on your page. I'm not gonna lie, this can get a bit complicated, so if you have questions or you need a developer or just want to know what it all means do not hesitate to contact us.
After the contest is over, you can't inform the winners through Facebook. You should announce your winners through another platform like email, phone, etc. This is another reason why having a sign-up form on your website that links back to your Facebook page can be more beneficial for you. In line with collecting information—it's important you state in the rules and terms of the promotion that Facebook is not collecting the information for your promotion—you will need to disclose what information you are collecting and how this information will be used during the extent of your contest.
All promotions on Facebook should include:
- A complete release of Facebook by each entrant or participant.
- Acknowledgment that the promotion is in no way sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with, Facebook.
- Disclosure that the participant is providing information to [disclose recipient(s) of information] and not to Facebook.
All in all, Facebook can get a little complicated, so it's best to try to understand what they say about how to conduct business on their platform. If you have any more questions or you are more interested in setting up a promotion for your business using Facebook or any social network for that matter, feel free to contact us! We'd be happy to consult with you!