As a specific example of a The Best of the Best contest, consider a one where users vote for the best of the best in a city. A category could be ‘The Best Restaurant’, and subcategories could include ‘The Best Japanese’, ‘The Best Mexican’, ‘The Best Italian’, and so on, with as many subcategories as desired. These categories could include any sector of interest: beauty, health, leisure, etc.
Being chosen as the most voted in a category not only means recognition for quality, innovation, and service but can also become a competitive advantage.
A differential and highly valued point is that these contests offer the organizer an excellent opportunity for monetization through sponsorship. For this reason, many ‘best of the best‘ contests are organized by media outlets such as magazines, newspapers, or radio stations as they can leverage their sales team to sell more advertising space.
The best alternative to create a ‘Best of’ contest is the Voting Contest app. With it, you can boost participation and interaction easily and in an organized manner. Keep on reading to learn how you can manage these contests with Easypromos and the strategies to generate revenue with them.
Introduction: Selection of Candidates
As organizers of a ‘Best of’ type contest, the first consideration is how to select the candidates. There are two options: with nominations and without nominations
With nominations
In this dynamic, users propose the candidates, and the organizers decide which of these move to the voting stage. In other words, before the voting process begins, there is a preliminary stage where users nominate their favorite in each category. After receiving all the proposals, the organizer reviews them and selects the final candidates to compete for the votes.
Nominations can be open, allowing users to propose any candidate or be limited to a predefined group of candidates. Open nominations require more time and effort from organizers since they have to review the suggestions and make the final selection.
Without nominations
In this contest format, the organizer determines the candidates, skipping any preliminary nomination stage by users. Participants go directly to vote among a preselected set of candidates in various categories. This methodology allows for stricter control over the competing candidates and provides a more agile and direct start to the voting process, without the need for an extensive review and selection period for nominees.
Easypromos allows you to manage both contest formats, with nominations or without nominations. Additionally, it provides the necessary tools so that, in the case of nominations, all received proposals can be downloaded and analyzed.
Anatomy of a candidate
When the public suggests nominees, they usually only provide basic information, such as the candidate’s name. For example, if someone wants to nominate the best Italian restaurant in the city, they would only write ‘Pizzeria Mario’. However, when it’s the organizers who add a candidate, they typically include more comprehensive details. Following the same example, the organizer wouldn’t just mention the restaurant’s name but would also include its address and logo.
With Easypromos, a candidate’s profile can be complemented with the following information:
- Name.
- Short description.
- Profile image to go along with the candidate’s name.
- Country.
- External link, e.g. link to their website.
- Links to the candidate’s social media.
- Multimedia content: Image, video, texts, and PDF files.
The goal is to provide a complete profile of the candidate. As we’ll see later, one monetization avenue will be to offer ‘premium profiles’ for candidates to stand out among their competitors.
Get a feel of the user experience with this Best of the Best contest DEMO and discover all its possibilities.
Vote Management
Voters’ registration
In a public voting contest, identifying voters is crucial. With Easypromos, users have to complete a registration process to be able to vote. The first time a user votes, the system will prompt them to fill out a registration form. On the same registration screen, they will accept the contest’s terms, privacy policy, and consent to be incorporated into the organizer’s database. Once the registration is completed, they can vote throughout the contest duration without having to register again; the system will only ask for login details. The login can be by email, mobile phone (with SMS validation), or through social login: Google, Facebook, or X (Twitter). The contest organizer will receive voters’ contact information, and if consent is given, they can incorporate it into their CRM or newsletter distribution systems.
Categories and Sections
Once the candidates have been selected, public voting galleries will be set up. With Easypromos, you can create as many categories and subcategories as needed. As seen in the example in the introduction, you can create categories like ‘Best Restaurant,’ ‘Best Tourist Attraction,’ ‘Best Cultural Event,’ among others. Managing multiple categories is particularly useful when there’s a wide range of participants grouped into different sections and categories. Organizing by categories simplifies navigation and user selection in the contest. Additionally, contest organizers can gather precise and well-segmented data on audience preferences.
Look & Feel
Depending on the number of categories, subcategories, and candidates, it might be better to go for a presentation rich in images or a more textual format. For example, if there are five categories, you can present each category with an image, but if there are 100 categories, it would be better to present them in a textual mode. The same applies to candidates; there is the option to show a complete profile for each candidate or display a list with the candidate’s name or title. Furthermore, as with the rest of Easypromos dynamics, the entire graphic aspect of the interface can be customized: fonts, colors, background, buttons, links, header, and footer.
Frequency and number of votes
One configuration decision the contest organizer must make is determining how many votes each voter gets and how often they can vote. The most common options are daily votes, weekly votes, or a total number of votes. Moreover, the voting system can be refined through advanced voting, where instead of giving a simple vote to a candidate, several points are allocated. For instance, giving 10 points to the favorite, 9 to the second, 8 to the third, and so on. Similar to the system used by Eurovision to distribute points among participating countries.
Fraud control
If you’ve browsed the Easypromos admin panel or our blog, you’ve probably seen that fraud control is one of our main concerns, and we’ve dedicated a lot of effort to R&D in this area. Simply speaking, with Easypromos, voting contests are protected from robots, automatic scripts, and users who use temporary email accounts. Furthermore, we maintain a database of malicious IPs and domains, making it extremely challenging for cheaters to interfere in your contest. Additionally, the Easypromos security center gives you total control over any unwanted access to your contest.
Voting Results
As the organizer, you can decide whether to show the voting results openly or not to publish the votes for each candidate. Once the voting period is over, the system allows you to award prizes to the most voted candidates, as well as to distribute prizes among all voters. Keep in mind that, beyond tallying the voting results, with Easypromos you can collect contact details from all the voters.
How to generate income with a “Best of…” contest
Sponsorship is the key to generating income in a ‘best of’ voting contest. There are several strategies you can implement to maximize the economic benefits of these events:
Sponsorship by categories and subcategories
Companies can sponsor specific categories such as ‘Best Restaurant,’ ‘Best Café,’ etc. This approach not only provides visibility to a relevant audience but also associates with the quality and prestige of being a sponsor of the ‘best of.’ Moreover, subcategories like ‘The best Mexican restaurant’ or ‘The best artisan bakery’ offer more specific and targeted sponsorship opportunities, which can be particularly attractive for local businesses or specialized brands.
Featured candidates
Another source of income comes from offering ‘premium profiles‘ to candidates. For a fee, a restaurant, a café, or any other participant can stand out in the voting with a more visual and attractive profile. These premium profiles can include features such as photos, videos, links, and other elements that make them stand out among standard candidates.
Are you looking to create a Best of the Best contest with fewer images or with a survey style? Try this DEMO and discover its possibilities.
Advertising and sponsored content
Apart from direct sponsorship of categories, you can generate income by selling advertising space on the website and in the contest’s promotional channels. This can include banners, mentions on social media, or even sponsored content that integrates with the contest theme, such as articles or videos about previous winners or trends in relevant categories.
Strategic partnerships
Establishing partnerships with media outlets and other platforms can increase the visibility of the contest and, consequently, its value for sponsors. For example, partnering with a local radio station or a popular blog could include cross-promotion and special coverage of the contest.
Data analysis and audience segmetation
An additional advantage for sponsors is access to data and analysis on audience preferences. With appropriate consent, you can offer sponsors valuable information about voting trends, user preferences, and demographics. This enables brands to refine their marketing strategies and better understand their target audience.
Events and cross promotion
Finally, consider organizing events related to the contest, such as award ceremonies or tasting events with the highlighted candidates. These events can be another source of income through ticket sales, additional sponsorships, and cross-promotion.
Conclusion
In summary, ‘best of’ contests are not only an excellent way to engage and excite your audience but also represent a significant opportunity to generate income. With the aforementioned monetization strategies, you can turn these contests into lucrative and stimulating events for both participants and sponsors.
If you’re interested in exploring the potential of these contests, we recommend you experiment with Easypromos. You can start by creating an account for free, allowing you to design, customize, and test your contest at no cost. This way, you can familiarize yourself with the tool and discover how it can adapt to your specific needs.
Feel free to contact the Easypromos team to clarify any doubts or if you desire a personalized demo. Dare to discover the power of ‘best of’ contests with Easypromos!
