The Tricky Business Of Running Competitions On Facebook

Using Facebook to manage social media competitions has become a common practice for many businesses.

It makes sense as asking people to “Like” your Facebook page in order to enter a competition is dead easy. And it’s this simplicity that often leads to more people entering your competition and ultimately more people connecting with your brand on Facebook.

But there’s one significant problem with this type of competition entry.

It’s in breach of Facebook’s terms and conditions. Section III E. iv. states:

“You must not use Facebook features or functionality as a promotion’s registration or entry mechanism. For example, the act of liking a Page or checking in to a Place cannot automatically register or enter a promotion participant.”

So yes, it is a common practice… but it may also get you in hot water.

Exactly how then can you run a competition in Facebook without risking your Page being pulled down?

One solution is to use a dedicated competition entry form that is embedded within your Facebook Page. With the new ‘Add to Facebook‘ feature now available within your Vision6 account, embedding a competition entry form is super easy to do.

Here’s how it works.

Simply create yourself a web form using the Vision6 Web Form Editor and then click the Add to Facebook link to embed it into your Facebook page. It really is that easy.

But if you’d like to see how it’s done, check out this short tutorial video.

Here’s a great example of how Betta Electrical have used this feature to run a competition.

So over to you. What’s your experience with Facebook competitions and web forms? Have you tried out the new ‘Add to Facebook’ feature yet? If so, what did you think? Let me know by sharing your experiences and feedback using the comments section below.