An excellent way to boost participation and attention for your social media pages is to run an occasional contest or giveaway. Few things attract attention and excitement like to chance to win a prize, even if that prize is a toothbrush or ten-dollar gift card! Giveaways and contests can be one of the greatest tools for your cosmetic dental practice to gain awareness and become likable online. We've laid out a few simple steps and ideas for your practice to leverage giveaways for maximum reach.

Make it easy for yourself, your team, and your followers

Decide on small, easy prizes to avoid putting a strain on your marketing budget. Examples of small prizes are things like a gift card to a local coffee shop, an electric toothbrush, or a gift basket with treats. Small prizes are enough to get people interested in your practice. For your fans and patients, entering to win a prize is less about the significance of the prize and more about the chance they have to connect with you have some fun. Make it easy to participate by inviting your fans to comment on your post, like your post, and/or follow your page to be entered to win. If you make contests and giveaways simple to enter, you'll gain more likes and follows that is sure to build your social media presence.

Keep it engaging

Your social media presence should not always be focused on the clinical side of dentistry. Post a funny dental-themed photo and ask your followers to come up with a creative caption. Tell your fans that your team will vote on the winner with the most clever caption. 

Post a throwback photo of a doctor or team member! Grab a childhood photo from one of your team members and share it on your page asking your patients to guess who it is. Share a couple of fun facts about the person to give your page an online personality and to form a connection with patients. Give a small prize to whoever guesses the correct answer first.

Celebrate a lesser-known holiday like Donut Day or National Smile Day. Lookup a few obscure holidays and make a fun post celebrating it in the practice. For example, if you celebrate Donut Day, bring in donuts for the office and snap a couple of pictures with team members eating them. Ask your patients what their favorite donut is and announce that one lucky commenter will win a prize. 

Make it sharable

As part of your contest entry, invite patients and followers to tag a friend in the comment. For example, “Happy Mother's Day! Tag a mom that you love and appreciate in the comments!” This is an excellent way to expand your reach to your patients' friends and family members — the people most likely to become new patient referrals. Another way to get great reach on your giveaway or contest post is to have your team mention the social media giveaway to the patients they see in the practice. You may also consider putting a little bit of money behind boosting your post to get more attention.

People do business with people that they like and trust. The purpose of your social media pages is to be friendly, authentic, and engaging with online users. Potential patients go to dental social media pages to get an idea of your team culture. If your page is inviting and pleasant, that tells potential patients that they can expect an inviting and pleasant experience from your practice. Since many people have anxiety about visiting the dentists, it's important that your social media focus is to connect with patients before they even come into your practice.