8 Ideas for Social Media Rewards

Last month during my kid’s spring break we took a little trip to a favorite destination of mine as a child, the Science Museum of Oklahoma. This place was always a magical place of learning for me! Thirty-something years later was no different. Ok, maybe it wasn’t as “magical” but still I learned something before I even walked in the door. I saw something I had never seen before. It was right in front of their building with a familiar giant “F” in a blue box painted in the parking spot and a sign that read “Facebook Fan Parking.” I thought to myself, “what a unique reward.” I took a picture and as soon as I got back from vacation I emailed some of my teammates and asked for examples of social rewards from other nonprofits. To my shock and somewhat dismay, I realized that hardly any nonprofits are rewarding their constituents for social engagement. So I really have to ask, why not?

The for-profit world tends to understand the value of their social customers and establishing some sort of social media reward program. They take advantage of the information from a 2010 study by CMB Consumer Pulse that says 51% of Facebook fans and 67% of Twitter followers are more likely to buy their product SINCE becoming a fan/follower. They also take advantage of the information that 60% of Facebook fans and 79% of Twitter followers are more likely to recommend their business/product SINCE becoming a fan/follower. If for-profits take this information and reward their consumers then why shouldn’t nonprofits? Both have the same marketing goals: reach more people and raise more funds.

To find examples of social media rewards I really had to look at the for-profit world. What I found were rewards that ranged from the very simple to the very expensive. I found some Facebook sites that simply rewarded with a “thank you [NAME]” while some businesses, like Coca-Cola, have Facebook pages dedicated to rewarding their customers (My Coke Rewards).

I know the best-practice for a blog post is to keep it short, but instead of making you chase link after link of reward ideas I thought I’d go ahead and post some of my favorite, and simple, social reward programs here. These are found throughout the internet and not really new ideas but it’s my hope that you’ll read one of these and implement at least one social reward idea into a program of your own if you don’t already have one in place.