So, can you require the winner to be present when you draw the winners on your sweepstakes?

The answer is NO.

The winner nor the participants cannot spend time or money (consideration) to participate in the sweepstakes. Asking participants to be present may be construed by state authorities as having to “spend” time (be at the venue) or money (gas) to participate. We recommend offering your sweepstakes promotion and then shipping the prize to the winner.

But first, what are sweepstakes?

A sweepstakes is a promotion where participants enter to win a prize by completing a task, like filling out a form or purchasing a product. Businesses and organizations usually run these promotions as a marketing tactic to boost awareness and sales.

Winners are chosen at random from all eligible entries. Some sweepstakes have specific eligibility requirements, such as being a certain age or residing in a particular geographic area. In the US, some states require you to bond and register in order to run the sweepstakes. 

Why You Shouldn’t Require Your Sweepstakes Winners to Be Present

Requiring your winners to be present can be interpreted by state authorities as having to “spend” time (be at the venue) or money (gas) to participate.

Avoids Bias

Drawing a winner should be fair and random. Requiring participants to be present during the draw can leave room for bias. It ensures that all participants have an equal chance at winning and eliminates any perceptions of unfairness. 

Do Not Limit Your Pool of Eligible Entries

It may limit your pool of eligible entries if the winner is unable or unwilling to attend the drawing. Requiring attendance may also limit the number of potential entrants since every location has a physical capacity.

Instead, we recommend you utilize a random selection method, such as using a computer generator or numbered tickets in a container.

Ensure that Your Sweepstakes is Legal

State authorities may view the requirement for the winner to be present for the drawing as a way of “spending” time (being at the venue) or money (on gas) to participate. Make sure that your official rules comply with the sweepstakes laws. We recommend offering your sweepstakes promotion and then shipping the prize to the winner.

Participating & Winning Without Being Present is Possible

Participating in sweepstakes without being physically present can be as easy as entering online or through social media.

By visiting the website or the sponsor’s social media page, individuals can fill out an entry form with their personal information and submit it for a chance to win. They can also enter by mailing a handwritten entry form or texting a unique code to a designated number as in text-to-win style of sweepstakes.

How to Notify Sweepstakes Winners

After the winners are chosen at random, then the winners are contacted through the details they provided in their entry form. The sweepstakes official rules should mention when the winners need to respond to get the prizes. It’s best to give them 5-7 days. If there is no response, a new person will be chosen as the winner.

Here are the best methods for notifying sweepstakes winners:

Text for Text-to-Win Promotions

A text message to the winning number with a follow-up call.

Email

Congratulate the winner, remind them of the promotion, and lay out the next steps to claim the prize. 

You can read more in our article: How to Notify Your Sweepstakes Winners

How to Award the Sweepstakes Prize?

Here are several ways for awarding your promotion’s prizes:

Ship the Prizes

Send the prize directly to the winner’s mailing address. Request a signed release form for privacy and legal protection.

Pick Up

Another option is to arrange for the winner to pick up the prize at a designated location, such as the sponsoring company’s office or an established retail store as long as the winner does not have to spend money to pick up the prize

Online Redemption

You can offer an online redemption code or virtual gift card instead of a physical prize. Make sure you provide clear instructions for the redemption of the digital gift. 

Conclusion

The winner nor the participants cannot spend time or money (consideration) to participate in the sweepstakes. Asking participants to be present may be construed by state authorities as having to “spend” time (be at the venue) or money (gas) to participate. We recommend offering your sweepstakes promotion and then shipping the prize to the winner.

Backed with over 10 years of experience, Sweeppea has helped many businesses turn their participants into customers. For more information on how Sweeppea can help you with your next sweepstakes, contact us at support@sweeppea.com or call us at 305-505-5393.

The post True or False: Sweepstakes Winner MUST Be Present to Win appeared first on Sweeppea Blog.

Celebrities and influencers are often hired for sweepstakes and contests in order to give your brand a positive head start or better reputation in the marketplace.

While the right celebrity can drive entries for your sweepstakes or contest, there are many considerations that should be weighed carefully first.

Before you proceed with hiring a celebrity spokesperson to endorse your sweepstakes or contest, make sure to think of the pros and cons for your brand first.

Influencers and celebrities can both negatively and positively affect a sweepstakes or contest promotion. Here is what you should know about celebrity sweepstakes promotions before you proceed:

Celebrity Endorsers for Sweepstakes and Contests: The Pros

Celebrity endorsements can be highly profitable for sweepstakes sponsors. Celebrities can often persuade a sweepstakes entrant to make a purchase from your brand when they otherwise might have held back until the contest was over or not purchased at all.

Celebrities Boost Sales

Why do brands use influencers to promote products and services? The answer is simple:

Celebrities and influencers can be extremely lucrative for businesses. In fact, a study found that celebrities who endorse a promotion can boost sales by as much as 4%!

Influencers and celebrities can deliver the social proof that your brand is worth taking a look at when they use test out products or services from your brand for their own audiences.

Also Read: How to Include Sweepstakes Rules in Your Social Media Campaigns

Tap Into New Audiences

Celebrities and influencers bring their audience to you.

Instead of having to spend money on advertising in order to amass a group of potential sweepstakes entrants, you can tap directly into a ready-made audience with interests that are similar to your preferred target audience.

Also Read: How a Sweepstakes Can Help Boost Sales

When Celebrity Marketing Goes Wrong

Celebrities can hurt your brand when you make sweepstakes and contest marketing mistakes. Aside from failing to properly negotiate the deal, the problem that sweepstakes sponsors often face is choosing the wrong celebrity for the contest or sweepstakes.

Here are 3 mistakes to avoid and why:

Mistake #1: Not Negotiating Contract Terms Properly

The celebrity needs to be able to work with you on terms that make it possible for you to back out of the deal if it’s not working out.

Furthermore, you also need to specify when your sweepstakes promotion will take place and what events and advertising and other marketing materials you will need the celebrity or influencer to be a part of.

Mistake #2: Hiring Celebrities With Bad Reputations

Carefully evaluate the celebrity’s reputation to ensure that any bad press that the celebrity receives doesn’t also become bad press for your brand.

Mistake #3: Not Hiring the Right Celebrity for Your Brand

It’s vital to protect your brand at all costs. At the same time, while reputation is important, the celebrity still needs to be a good fit for your brand’s target audience.

Also Read: Sweepstakes Fraud: How It Happens and How to Protect Your Sweepstakes or Contest

5 Tips For Working With a Celebrity for a Sweepstakes or Contest

Now that you know about the pros and cons of celebrity sweepstakes, here are a few points to consider as you plan your sweepstakes:

1. Don’t Limit Your Promotion to A-listers

Celebrity endorsements for sweepstakes and contests don’t only involve A-listers. In fact, a local celebrity or micro-influencer might work just as well to boost brand awareness and sales at a fraction of the cost.

And unless you’re one of the few companies that an A-list celebrity promotes, it will likely not give you the same return on investment as hiring a few or a team of B-listers or local influencers with followings that match your target audience.

2. Know Your Audience

The match between the celebrity’s or influencer’s demographic and your brand must be as close as possible. This is how you maximize participants for your sweepstakes or contest.

3. Use Social Media

Social media can greatly expand your reach when it comes to tapping into new audiences to find new customers and sweepstakes participants.

In fact, influencer marketing is one of the most popular ways for brands use social media to advertise products and services.

By leveraging the social media accounts of a celebrity and influencer who has a following, you’ll be able to get access to audiences that your brand does not have access to on its own.

4. Consider Sweepstakes Timing and Launch

All sweepstakes and contests involve setup steps that need to be addressed, in addition to, any contractual agreements with celebrities and influencers.

As a result, it’s important that you work with a full-service sweepstakes administration company to ensure that any sweepstakes law compliance steps are handled on your behalf.

5. Hire A Sweepstakes Company for Celebrity Sweepstakes Official Rules

A sweepstakes company like Sweeppea can help you with services such as drafting official rules, winning drawing, prize fulfillment, and sweepstakes law compliance.

They will also ensure that any additional terms for your sweepstakes needed in order for you to work with the celebrity or have the celebrity interact with sweepstakes participants are included in your official rules.

Also Read: Sweepstakes and Contest Administration Management Services: How They Benefit Your Promotion

Start Now to Plan Your Celebrity Sweepstakes

Celebrity endorsements can deliver a major ROI for your sweepstakes or contest. However, it’s important for you to have a clear vision for your promotion, including goals and target audience, before making a deal.

Building a sweepstakes or contest that involves a celebrity or influencers requires extensive planning.

A professional sweepstakes company can you to conceptualize your sweepstakes campaign so that you’ll be able to correctly match an influencer or celebrity with your promotion.

Need help with sweepstakes or contest management? Call 305-505-5393 or email us with your questions.

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An affidavit of eligibility and release is a legal requirement that is included in sweepstakes rules to help verify whether a potential winner of a sweepstakes or contest is eligible to win a prize. An affidavit is simply a statement, sworn in writing, that confirms that certain facts are true.

Here is what you should know about the affidavit of eligibility and publicity/liability releases and your sweepstakes rules.

What Is an Affidavit of Eligibility and Liability/Publicity Release?

The Affidavit is a written statement voluntarily signed by the winner under an oath or affirmation used to confirm the winner’s identity. The affidavit of eligibility will typically require the sweepstakes winner to verify personal information, such as their name, age, and address and eligibility to win as per Official Rules.

Sweepstakes winners must also verify their social security number (required for the issuance of a Form 1099-MISC for tax purposes).

The Affidavit of Eligibility and Liability/Publicity Release also includes a Publicity release that allows the Sponsor, if desired and where permitted by law, the right to use the winner(s) name, image and likeness for advertising or publicity purposes.

Also Read: Your Sweepstakes Rules Checklist

Why Do Sweepstakes Winners Need Affidavits?

The affidavit of eligibility verifies that the sweepstakes winner(s):

• Entered true and accurate information on the sweepstakes entry form.
• Complied with the Official Rules of the promotion.
• Is eligible to win a prize and doesn’t have any association with the Sponsor, sweepstakes administrator, or judging agency (for contests).
• Agreed to the terms and conditions for claiming the sweepstakes prize.
• Is a resident of the state(s) where the sweepstakes was offered.

As a reminder, if you want to use the sweepstakes winners in any promotional branded content, make sure that they sign a release form first.

When Do You Need to Send the Affidavit?

The Affidavit of Eligibility and Liability/Publicity Release is sent to winner(s) of Prizes whose value is over $600. The Sponsors will use the information to issue a Form 1099-MISC to the sweepstakes winner for tax purposes.

Also Read: How to Handle Winner Notification in Your Sweepstakes Rules

Is Notarization for Affidavit Of Eligibility or Publicity Release Required?

For some sweepstakes or contests, namely those with a high value prize, such as a large cash prize, vacation package, or car, some Sponsors may opt to request a neutral third-party serve as a witness, such as a notary public, in verifying the information submitted by the sweepstakes winners.

However, notarization of the Affidavit of Eligibility and Liability/Publicity Release is NOT required in order for your sweepstakes promotion to be legal.

Need help with sweepstakes or contest management? Call 305-505-5393 or email us with your questions.

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The COVID-19 pandemic has changed how brands are doing sweepstakes. As you consider hiring a sweepstakes company to help you run a sweepstakes, what should you do differently this year to ensure that your sweepstakes is a success? 

Understanding the best sweepstakes to run in 2021 is critical to keeping consumers engaged and exceeding their expectations. The good news is that this year has offered us a wealth of insight into what is working and what is not working. 

Here are some ideas for sweepstakes to run in 2021.

1. Instant Win

When the pandemic hit, many shoppers dialed back on shopping at retail locations in favor of delivery services or buying online. As a result, brands had to double-down on their messaging in order to reach their customers who may never see their in-store sweepstakes promotions. 

The solution? Brands are now running more instant win sweepstakes than ever. By letting customers know that they can enter to win a prize on a monthly basis, recurring instant win sweepstakes help brands reach both online and in-store customers.

Also Read: What Instant Win Game Sweepstakes Rules Should Include

2. Staycation Sweepstakes Prize

With COVID-19 impacting global travel, certain sweepstakes prizes such as vacation packages, are simply too difficult to deliver amidst a pandemic. Brands are skipping out on the flights and exotic vacation destinations in favor of staycations by offering weekend “getaways” to local places that are close to where the sweepstakes winners live.

This helps keep sweepstakes winners safe and also ensures that the brand can actually deliver the prize once the sweepstakes has ended.

3. COVID-19 Vaccine Sweepstakes

Some brands are also pitching in to help with the effort to get more Americans vaccinated against COVID-19. COVID-19 vaccine sweepstakes are popular this year with brands offering sweepstakes prizes such cash, scholarships and gift cards.

The prizes are exciting and are attracting eager sweepstakes entrants who have gotten the vaccine. COVID-19 vaccine sweepstakes are also easy to enter because the official rules permit entrants who have been vaccinated to be automatically entered into the drawing pool of potential winners.

Hire a Sweepstakes Company to Manage Your Sweepstakes

The bottom line? COVID-19 has brought a lot of changes to promotional marketing. As a result, hiring a sweepstakes company to manage your sweepstakes is your best bet in 2021.

With many employees working remotely and job openings at an all-time high in some industries, brands are finding it harder to manage sweepstakes in-house. Sweepstakes management gives you everything you need to manage your sweepstakes professionally.

A sweepstakes company will also review your sweepstakes to ensure that it follows sweepstakes laws and is executed smoothly. Now you can look forward to a well-run sweepstakes that delights customers and meets your ROI goals.

Need help with sweepstakes or contest management? Call 305-505-5393 or email us with your questions.

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Want a great way to thank your customers? Offer them the chance to enter and win a sweepstakes! You can require a purchase to enter a sweepstakes as long as you offer a free method of entry. By law, you have to give participants a way of entering that does not require a purchase.

Here’s how to require a purchase for your sweepstakes.

“Customer-only” Sweepstakes Must Have Free Method of Entry

A “customer-only” sweepstakes means that only people who have purchased from your brand can enter. However, sweepstakes law requires that you also offer a free method of entry for your sweepstakes. 

In this case, you can require that new or old customers make a purchase in order to get access to a way to enter the sweepstakes. On the other hand, you must let customers know how to access the free method of entry in your sweepstakes advertisements.

To enter without making a purchase and uploading a Photo, hand print your first and last name, your complete street address, phone number, email and date of birth on a 3” x 5” index card or piece of paper and place into an outer-mailing envelope with proper postage affixed and mail it to:

Free Method of Entry Language

How does this work in real life?

Companies that sell physical products put sweepstakes entry game pieces inside of the products or details printed inside of the packaging so that a purchase must be made to access the promotion. 

To enter via the free method of entry, the outside of the product packaging invites potential entrants to visit the company’s sweepstakes website for access to the sweepstakes free web entry form.

eCommerce companies that sell a digital product or service can ask customers to scan a copy of a receipt as proof of purchase to submit with their web entry form submission. Or you can automatically offer entries based on the amount of the purchase or on the types of items purchased. Entrants who haven’t made a purchase, can enter on the free entry form.

Can I Avoid the “No Purchase Required” Restriction?

Use cases

Here are some examples of companies that use “customer-only” sweepstakes:

• Non-alcoholic beverage brands
• Cereal and breakfast food brands
• Beauty product brands

Overall, the companies that fare best with customer-only promotions are those with an established customer base or access to an extensive customer base via a partner, because it’s easier to incentivize a purchase with a prize from a customers who already loves your products.

Alcohol and Cannabis Brands Are Prohibited

Alcohol companies and cannabis brands are prohibited by law from using this type of sweepstakes. For these industries, both alcohol and cannabis purchases may never be required in order to enter a sweepstakes. Alcohol and cannabis sweepstakes also have additional requirements with regards to registration and bonding.  

Final Notes

The point of a customer-only sweepstakes is to encourage customers to make a purchase or increase their order amount in order to participate. However, if you want to offer a legally compliant sweepstakes, you have to make sure that purchase requirement doesn’t change the odds of winning by ensuring that free entries receive the average amount of paid entries for each free entry received.

For example, if you offer 3 products for purchase, with Product A = 3 Entries, Product B = 6 Entries, and Product C = 9 Entries, your free entry participants must receive at least 3 entries to ensure everyone (free and paid entries) has an equal chance of winning.

As a result, always make sure that it’s clear and unambiguously advertised that there is a free method of entry available in both your Official Rules and Abbreviated Rules.

Need help with sweepstakes or contest management? Call 305-505-5393 or email us with your questions.

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A successful sweepstakes promotion is designed to help you build a following and attract new customers. You may be wondering if it’s possible to restrict participants by gender in order to avoid having participants enter who are unlikely to become customers.

Here is what you should know about restricting participation by gender for a sweepstakes.

How Specific Can Your Entry Requirements Be?

The law permits you to limit your sweepstakes participation by age, gender or form of media. In the case of forms of media, this would apply if your company uses direct mail to reach a male audience, for example.

You are also permitted to limit your sweepstakes entrants to a particular trade. For example, you can set your sweepstakes to only be open to licensed plumbers, trade show attendees, wholesales, etc.

How Do I Restrict Participation in My Sweepstakes?

If you want your sweepstakes to be limited to entrants who meet certain criteria as defined above, you must provide the details in your sweepstakes Entry Requirements in your Official Rules.

For example, you can write:

“you must be a male, age 21 or over, and a recipient of this magazine to enter this Sweepstakes.”

to limit the eligibility to that specific group in your Official Rules.

This type of restriction is designed to reduce the sweepstakes audience to specific buyer personas. Discrimination that is otherwise prohibited under law is not permitted in this context and would void your sweepstakes under the law.

A Note of Caution About Limiting Your Audience

When restricting participation in your sweepstakes to a smaller audience, there is the potential to overlook would-be customers that don’t meet your current profile. Therefore, it’s best to leave your promotion open to as many people as possible which will increase its potential to go viral!

Eligibility Restrictions + Verification Requirements

Make sure to mention in the Official Rules that verification of eligibility will be required in order to claim the prize. You may require participants to submit valid proof of age. You can also require entrants to submit proof that they are a member of the eligible group by providing receipts, such as from a subscription payment or a one-time attended event.

Survey Your Entrants

A pool of targeted entrants is the perfect opportunity to get to know your customers better. Take this chance to survey your entrants with additional entry form questions so that you can find out more about how your audience interacts with your brand.

You can also conduct follow-up surveys to learn more about how your entrants felt about your promotion, whether they liked the prizes offered, the pace of the promotion, etc. To thank them for their time, offer a discount or coupon for your product or service.

Need help with sweepstakes or contest management? Call 305-505-5393 or email us with your questions.

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Does it make sense to allow multiple entries for your sweepstakes? Some sweepstakes only allow one entry per participant while others allow you to obtain as many chances as you like to win.

From our experience as a Sweepstakes Company, here are the pros and cons of each approach to entries for your sweepstakes.

Pros and Cons of Multiple Entries for Your Sweepstakes

The bad

If you want to give away a big prize, a sweepstakes that allows multiple entries may attract thousands more entries than a sweepstakes that only allows one entry per person. A multiple entry sweepstakes will also attract a lot more ineligible leads.

As a result, the combination of a big prize and multiple entries for your sweepstakes may defeat the purpose of running the giveaway in the first place (which was to bring in low-cost, viable leads).

The good

Multiple entries for your sweepstakes can help increase brand awareness and aid in your promotion go viral faster. People will visit the Entry Page, website, or social pages more often if they know that multiple entries will increase their odds of winning a cool prize.

Pros and Cons of One Entry Sweepstakes

The bad

On the other hand, while your prize may seem enticing to entrants, with a one entry sweepstakes, participants know that there is a much lower chance of winning due to the fact that there are so many people vying for a single prize.

The result? Your one entry sweepstakes may lead to fewer entrants as people may feel they have lower chances of winning.

The good

Participants see single entry as more fair since everyone has the same chance of winning. It’s often perceived as less of a burden to entry and provides the chance to the Sponsor to pre-qualify participants for sales leads by asking for additional information like questions about purchase intent or market research.

The Verdict

So what are companies actually doing when it comes to one entry vs multiple entries sweepstakes?

According to our study of 350 recent promotions, 64% of brands allowed a single or one-time entry per participant. That means that the majority of brands favor one entry sweepstakes.

Ultimately, single or multiple entries depends on the objective of the promotion. For example, Sponsors seeking brand awareness may want as many people as possible to enter, while sponsors looking for sales want only the right target customers to enter.

Need help with sweepstakes or contest management or administration? Call 305-505-5393 or email us with your questions.

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What do you need to know to run a sweepstakes in Puerto Rico? Companies that offer sweepstakes in the United States typically exclude residents of Puerto Rico from participating. That is because in the past sweepstakes sponsors had additional requirements that they need to fulfill which differ from mainland USA requirements.

Here is what you should know about Puerto Rico sweepstakes law.

Spanish Language Sweepstakes Rules

Prior to 2009, it was required that any sweepstakes being offered in Puerto Rico must also make their official rules available in Spanish.

However, thanks to the Puerto Rico sweepstakes law changes made in 2009 by the Puerto Rico Department of Consumer Affairs, this Spanish language official rules requirement no longer applies. It is okay to have English only rules for your sweepstakes. However, if the sweepstakes promotion itself is written in Spanish, Spanish language official rules are required.

Even if your promotion is written in English, it is a good idea to create Spanish official rules given that Spanish is the most widely spoken language in Puerto Rico. This will make it easier and more comfortable for entrants from Puerto Rico to enter.

(As a sweepstakes company, we offer Official Rules creation in Spanish.)

Official Rules Can Be Published Online

Prior to the 2009 rules change, official rules for Puerto Rico sweepstakes were required to be published in newspapers or magazines. Now it is perfectly fine to publish the official rules for your sweepstakes online.

Just make sure to follow best practices and sweepstakes laws, and make sure that a link to your official rules appears on all ads for your sweepstakes.

No Notary Required

Another significant change to Puerto Rico sweepstakes law is that you no longer have to have a notary public certify winner drawing or game pieces. A notary is not required to certify any aspect of your sweepstakes promotion.

No Purchase Necessary

When it comes to impermissible consideration, the regulations were amended as of 2009 to limit impermissible consideration to include payments or another act that financially benefits the sponsor of the sweepstakes.

Just make sure to include a “no purchase necessary” clause in your sweepstakes rules and abbreviated rules and you’ll be covered here.

Winner Selection Requirements

Winner selection requirements prior to 2009 meant that you had to wait as long as 30 days before you could select a new winner in the event that the original winner did not respond.

Now you only have to wait a few days before selecting a new winner and you can also notify winners via email and phone instead of only via postal mail. In the event that a new winner needs to be selected, you can do so quickly, allowing you to finalize your winners list much faster.

Need a Puerto Rico Sweepstakes Review?

If you want to run a sweepstakes in Puerto Rico, just have our team verify your sweepstakes rules before it goes live. As Sweepstakes administrators review will ensure that your Puerto Rico giveaway is fully-compliant and ready to launch. ¡Vamos!

Need help with sweepstakes or contest management? Call 305-505-5393 or email us with your questions.

The post What You Should Know About Running a Sweepstakes in Puerto Rico appeared first on Sweeppea Blog.

Want to learn more about COPPA and your sweepstakes rules? These are the very specific rules that govern sweepstakes targeted towards children under the age of 13.

Here is what you need to know to ensure that your sweepstakes rules are COPPA compliant.

What Is COPPA?

COPPA (The Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act) went into effect on April 21, 2000. It applies to the online data collection of personal information from children under 13 years of age.

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is responsible for the creation and revision of compliance guidelines related to COPPA. The compliance guidelines cover a number of aspects including parental consent. However, they namely provide a clear plan on how online services must act in order to ensure that minors’ privacy and safety are maintained online.

To avoid compliance issues, many brands simply opt to require sweepstakes entrants to be 18 or 21 years of age in order to enter their promotions. However, for vendors in some industries, such as alcohol and tobacco sales, minors must be shielded from accessing the company’s website or online portal altogether.

COPPA Sweepstakes Rules Compliance

To ensure that your promotion is fully compliant, we recommend that you request a sweepstakes review before your promotion goes live. In the meantime, here are the basics of how to comply with COPPA that you should make sure to follow:

Parental Consent. If you plan to collect any information that is personally identifiable from children under the age of 13, you have to obtain permission from the child’s parent. Examples of information that is personally identifiable include a full name, telephone number, home address.

If a parent requests it, you must also provide a way for them to access the information and have it deleted. Since minors can not be legally bound to a contract, the parent must provide the consent to your sweepstakes rules.

Opt-in. After you have obtained consent from the parent, the child must opt-in in order to participate in your sweepstakes.

Privacy Policy. Along with your sweepstakes rules, you must include a privacy policy that explains what information is collected and when, where and how it will be collected and stored.

COPPA and Social Media

Most social media sites disallow users under the age of 13 as part of their terms of service. Therefore, even if you have obtained the consent of the parent, you may still be in breach of COPPA if the child wants to enter your sweepstakes via a social media site.

Instead, review social media guidelines to ensure that your sweepstakes rules are not in breach of the terms of service due to COPPA legal compliance concerns.

Are There Any Exceptions to COPPA?

If you’d like to review COPPA compliance rules in their entirety, the FTC provides an explanation of each instance in which you are required to take action to comply with COPPA and exactly what steps are involved. They also provide a chart outlining the exceptions to the COPPA parental consent rules here.

For further assistance with creating COPPA compliant sweepstakes rules, contact us for a sweepstakes review and further recommendations.

Need help with sweepstakes or contest management? Call 305-505-5393 or email us with your questions.

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Bonus entries are an easy to way extend the reach of your sweepstakes. It doesn’t require much effort to implement on your part. However, it does require that your entrants participate more if they want to increase their odds of winning.

The key to getting entrants to go the extra mile to submit bonus entries for your sweepstakes? Make it fun! That is, the bonus entries should require the same amount or less effort than the initial entry.

Here is how to offer bonus entries in your sweepstakes and make it easy and exciting for your entrants:

Bonus Entry Idea #1: Share This Sweepstakes With a Friend

Want your sweepstakes to go viral? Offer a bonus entry for each additional friend that the entrant invites to the sweepstakes.

Make sure that your sweepstakes rules specify that the friend must successfully register for the sweepstakes with valid information in order for the additional bonus entry to be credited to them to avoid any fraudulent shares.

Bonus Entry Idea #2: Upload a Video or Photo Giving Your Brand a Shoutout

This bonus entry method can help you identify entrants who are brand loyalists. While you must make it clear that there is no purchase required in order to receive the bonus entry or join your sweepstakes in your sweepstakes rules, this can be a cool way to drive engagement with your brand.

Bonus Entry Idea #3: Watch a Video From Your Brand

If you’ve recently created a new commercial or video for your product or service, this is an easy way to help it go viral. Upload the video on your social media account or website and tell users they will receive a bonus entry if they watch it in its entirety.

Things to Consider Before Offering Bonus Entries

Before you decide to offer bonus entries for your sweepstakes, consider the following:

Bonus entries from sharing are against Facebook TOS. While bonus entries can help your sweepstakes go viral, keep in mind that giving away bonus entries for sharing a sweepstakes on Facebook is against Facebook promotion guidelines.

The FTC requires that users disclose that they received an incentive for sharing a social media post. So to indicate that the social post is a part of your sweepstakes, require your entrants to include #sweepstakes or #yourbrandsweepstakes with their post.

Finally, be prepared for some entrants to simply spam. People don’t like to share with close friends but they will be more than happy to spam people they don’t care about or don’t actually know in order to receive bonus entries. Make sure that your sweepstakes rules indicate that you will not count bonus entries that are the result of spamming or using other methods to game the system.

Need help with sweepstakes or contest management? Call 305-505-5393 or email us with your questions.

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