There is a lot of buzz these days about user-generated advertising contests...and for good reason.
User-generated advertising increases engagement from consumers, provides fresh creative at an attractive price, and gives brands great feedback about their products and services. You only have to look at the success of the Dorito's Crash the Superbowl UGC video contest to see that video contests are here to stay.
In light of this, I thought it would be helpful to discuss what we at Zooppa have learned about choosing contest winners - the different ways contest entries are judged, and the effects these strategies can have on your creative community and the work they generate.
There are three ways to choose winning work, and each has its pros and cons:
The Viral Video Model:
In this model, entries are ranked according to how many views they receive.
The more views an entry gets, the higher it climbs in the contest rankings. Prizes are awarded to those who best promote their work through Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn and other social media channels.
PROS: You get tremendous viral spread of content during a contest, as creatives use every social media tool they know to campaign for votes. Beginners and first-time UGC creators like this model because it gives them a fair chance at winning by merely campaigning more than others. People with a large fan base (popular blog or YouTube account) see this as an easy way to win (see CONS).
CONS: Professionals and video contest veterans will steer clear of this type of competition. They see this as a popularity contest. Professionals spend more time, money and energy to make their ad and want to be judged on quality of work, not on views.
The Celebrity/Industry Jury Model:
In this model, handpicked jury members (either REAL celebrities, or creative industry professionals), look at all of the work in a competition and choose winners based on adherence to contest brief, script, and production quality.
PROS: You get much higher quality work overall. Competitions with high prize amounts and a jury model will get the attention of small production companies and top level creatives who calculate the risk versus reward of entering the contest and see that it is worth the effort and money to make a top-level video.
CONS: You don't get the viral spread of a viral-judging model. There is no incentive for creatives to campaign for their ad, as it is up to a panel of judges to pick winners based on merit. You also discourage some amateur creatives from entering (they rely on campaigning for votes to win).
The Viral/Jury Hybrid Model:
In this model you combine the pros of the first two models, and eliminate the cons.
This is Zooppa's model: We split prize money between Jury awards and community awards.
At Zooppa we carefully balance the awards for our contests between Jury awards and community voting awards. Community members are rewarded both for high-quality creative, and for their self-promotion abilities. In this manner, we achieve good viral spread, while ensuring quality creative.
Using both models like this gives you the best of both worlds.
Conclusion:
To get the most viral spread for a contest, award prizes based on views and community votes.
To get the best quality work, award prizes based on quality.
To get the best of both worlds use a mix of the two models, weighting most of the award money towards jury-chosen awards.
There are many nuances to this but this should serve as a good beginner's guide to thinking about user-generated contest management.
About the author: Kirk Mastin, Community Manager, Zooppa USA
A visual storyteller for the last nine years, Kirk has worked for the New York Times, Aurora Photos, the Associated Press and many other photo distribution networks nationwide. Moving beyond still photography, Kirk has worked as a cinematographer on a full-length documentary as well as writing, shooting and producing several short documentary pieces for the web. Kirk teaches visual storytelling in Seattle and worldwide, teaching the first batch of multimedia journalists for the hyper-local news network, FUTUROOM in the Czech Republic. Kirk writes about the future of media on his blog, and Kirk's personal work with the Flip Video camera is featured by technology editor David Pogue of the New York Times. Kirk has a Masters Degree in Digital Media from the University of Washington.
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