How to Generate 660 New Leads in a Week Using Social Media Challenges Take these three steps to achieve a broad reach on social media that can turn into new revenue sources for your business.
By Ben Simkin •
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Social media "challenges" are popping up all over the place. They are popular -- but before you jump on the bandwagon, you need to make sure you have the right strategy behind it. Otherwise, it'll be just a lot of busywork with no results to show.
I interviewed business growth and visibility strategist Jenn Scalia to learn about her approach because she's been getting outstanding results consistently, using social media challenges. For example, her most recent social media challenge generated 660 new leads and 40 new customers, which added $60,000 to her revenue in under a week.
"Challenges are a great way to generate buzz as part of launches, or just to create engagement in your community" says Scalia. "Here are the three things you need to know, to get it right."
1. Make it original and relevant to your specific audience
Make sure that your challenge encompasses something that your target market actually wants. Find out what their most pressing needs and biggest struggles are first, then create a challenge around that.
Related: 10 Laws of Social Media Marketing
You want your challenge to solve a problem. It's not enough for it just to be fun. You want them to have something at the end, whether that's a physical result, a game plan, a specific feeling, confidence, etc.
2. Keep it short and sweet
Challenges seem to run the gamut from three days to over a month long. Scalia says, for best results, you need to keep it brief, otherwise people drop off.
"I recommend challenges be from 7 to 10 days. Anything past that is overkill. People will drop off, forget about it, or just won't be that engaged. For example, my recent Gutsy Girls challenge was seven days long. It generated 660 new leads and we had 130 active participants play along. Because the challenge included a social shares component (using the custom #gutsygirls hashtag), our community created 550 social media posts and 85 videos. In under a week, we received 40 new customers, which resulted in $60,000 in sales for my new coaching program."
Related: How to Make Time for Social Media Marketing
3. Follow the CASH equation
C- Cohesive -- Make the challenge Step 1 or Step 0 before someone actually works with your or buys your product.
A- Actionable -- Don't overcomplicate this or give them too many things to do. One, quick but impactful actionable step will do the trick.
S- Sharable -- Offer something that they can use on their personal social media platforms or for their own business use. Make sure you have them @ tag you and use your specific challenge hashtag when sharing.
H- Helpful -- Each prompt should take them one step further along the path. It should be helpful in getting them where they want to go or to who they want to be. Your challenge should gently nudge them in the right direction.
Related: 6 Principles That Must Be Applied to Social Media Marketing
Of course, you can even further amplify the impact of using challenges on your bottom line when you integrate this strategy with using Facebook ads. That way, you benefit from the viral nature and social proof elements of the organic shares and have additional, highly targeted traffic hit your website.
