Great post, Amanda.

I really enjoy creating Facebook contest through apps because you can use much more creativity and make really unique contests.
However, I noticed that many companies have forgotten this option and runs those simple boring contests in their timeline.

Thanks for sharing! ?Is there a particular app you use??

You mentioned that Diamond Candles invited fans to like and share the post for the chance to win. I was always under the impression that asking fans to share a post as part of a competition contravenes Facebook's guidelines. Has this changed?

I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to encourage fans to share on their personal timeline - it's on a cans and can'ts list written very recently that summarises the rules

Hey Hannah Ruth Gilburt, you got that right, shares cannot be taken into account to determine a winner in a contest on Facebook, nor can it be required to enter. The main reason behind that is that it's technically impossible to track shares on Facebook (like if the user shares something and has its privacy set to "friends only", you'll never be able to capture it). So if you can't track shares, you can pick winners based on them, simple :-)

Thanks for clearing this up for me Emeric! Cheers, Heidi

I have two Facebook apps but I have never used them for any contests yet. I think having just one is enough though. Out of the two apps that I have, which one do you think is better, Woobox or 22Social? That way I can just keep the best one and cancel my subscription to the other one.

Hi John, you may want to ask the question in our LinkedIn group: https://www.linkedin.com/gr...

Thanks Cindy, I took your advice and I asked them.

Hi, I would really like to run an add like the Rocky Mountain Entertainment did ( Ask for Content and Votes type Comp ) Any ideas how I would go about this? Are there any FREE apps that are any good?

Thank you

What are the top 3 apps to use for a contest?

The only problem with contest of this nature is the participant doesn't have any real incentive to share the contest with other (except in the case of # 3)

Typically the more you share, the more people know about the contest, the more others enter which make your chances of inning less likely.

I particularly like the contact which allow you to share and for every person who engages with your share and in turn enters you earn additional votes so your chances actually increase and it's a huge incentive to share the contest!

This was very interesting, thank you. Have the rules changed again, are we now allowed to ask people to "like" our page to enter. Also what are your favourite contest apps?

I'm confused about the facebook contest app...is it meant for business pages?? It seems like it would be but when I try to create a contest it won't let me do so from my business page.

Thanks Amanda, great insights and use of examples. Where would you recommend small businesses who wish to keep contests simple and self-adminsitered source contest apps? Tabsite, Woobox? Cheers from Outback Aus.

Hi, Amanda.

There are great examples. Although, I've always wondered how well hashtags work on Facebook. With everyone's different privacy settings you might be missing a lot of the conversations that going on with the hashtag. For instance, you don't always see the real number of shares on a Facebook post because someone might have their privacy settings really high.

-Nick

You have people running scams on fb using creating fake game I was offer from a woman to whom I only was told to just ask her if I was a winner because she said her friend had won and she had also won { I thought Yeah you ok } haaa and she kindly said yes without any info this person say yes but then she did say i do need to get one thing ,, she ask for my formation complete and to send to unknown name give to said person $1,000 I am to send it to a western union in Chicago and then a delivery of $40,000 will be brought to my home . I ask her just for asking am I a winner she claims yes I am a christain and telling the truth her name is Agent Sally ? she will not give company name or number to contact her but to text lol but she did finally answer one of my questions today she said the money was coming from the CEO of FB Yes she been working on me for three days her an someone who claims she won and already received, already! We just spoke yesterday when ask for proof she then told me this today lol Please Tell me there are people watching over this business future is great but not set up to scam money from the honest hard working people families during the season or any other time. Must be reported

Great tips here! Especially love the one with the countdown clock to create a sense of urgency ... Thanks Amanda!

Fine, Amanda! I didn't guess that Facebook contest can be done more interestingly and in such a way, thanks!