Bracket Bolsters Community, Launches Annual Campaign

The Execution

Interactive content like brackets had always been something we wanted to explore, but we weren’t sure how receptive our audience would be to them. We decided to use this as our chance to test it out.

We called our bracket Card of the Month – People’s Choice. Running this contest monthly, we’d be able to showcase many readers. Not all of our crafters are creating year round, so this way people could still participate in the future.

Once we’d decided which crafting project to focus on – cards – we needed a way to gather the card designs from our readers. With a goal of increasing our social media presence, we created a Facebook group specifically designated to our Card of the Month campaign. Beyond encouraging submissions, this group created a fantastic community of our card makers.

Each month, our team narrows the entries into the top 32 bracket contenders. We use the reactions cards received in the Facebook group to help us seed the bracket. With 32 entries, our bracket is split into five rounds each lasting approximately five days.

To grow our database, we incorporate a simple registration form for voters. Beyond collecting the voters email addresses, we included an email opt-in for our newsletter and asked about each voter’s interests. Next we asked if the vote had read Creative Scrapbooker Magazine, so we can better market a subscription to these voters in the future.

We rely heavily on email to promote the Card of the Month – People’s Choice bracket. Incorporating invite emails and reminder emails all within our bracket tool encourages our audience to come back and vote each round for their favorites. We also included the contest in all of our newsletters to our subscribers.

Since the dedicated Facebook group has been so popular, we also are sure to post there to announce each round. In addition, we post to the Creative Scrapbooker Magazine main Facebook page.

We also make sure the Card of the Month contest is featured prominently on our website. Not only is it posted on our contests page, but we also have ads for it on our homepage and all our other pages of our website.

The Results

The response to the Card of the Month bracket has been fantastic! In our first month, more than 1,300 people participated, over 13,000 votes were cast, and we collected more than 2,200 opt-ins towards two of our newsletters.

Our bracket proves to us that our readers are definitely receptive to contests like this. Not only do we plan on continuing this card contest monthly, but we’re also using this as inspiration for new contests and activities for our readers.

After seeing so much success, we’re hopeful to reach out to sponsors in the future to potentially make these contests a new revenue stream for us as well!