I am in the process of putting together my first contest for my personal finance site with a monetary cash prize. Basically it will be a simple survey and subscription to newsletter entry. I am looking to build continuous visits and site activity in an effort to drive traffic, advertising revenue (Adsense) and affiliate lead generation. Would like to hear some success stories about contests other webmasters have done in the past and how they successfully marketed their contest. Thinking about using forums and a press release to get the word out, but would like others input about additional marketing tips and contest setup tips. I am thinking of having a large cash prize (say $1000 or so) with a two or three month entry period and a referral system where people can refer friends and gain additional entries for each friend who also enters the contest.
I'm currently running a contest at www.productivity501.com giving away an iPod Shuffle. It is going much more slowly than I expected, but I've learned a few things on the way that might be useful to you: Make your contest tied to certain goals. For example, give away the prize after you've reached 500 subscribers to your email list or RSS feed. Don't just stipulate a time frame because you may end up with 10 entries and you'll be out your $1000. I saw one contest where they were giving away an iPod Shuffle if they got 1000 subscribers, a Nano if they got 2000, etc. You might be better off with several smaller prizes given away over time, so people know you are really going to give it away. For example, if you were to give away 5 iPod Nano's it might be cheaper and get more attention than $1000 cash. Just a thought. Expect to spend some money marketing the contest. You can use adsense or something else, but you will probably need to spend some money on it. If you can, introduce some type of viral element. For example, you could enter people an extra time in a drawing for each friend they referred. (You'd need the infrastructure to track this.) Think about the type of people you want to attract. I posted my contest on www.online-sweepstakes.com and immediately got 50 people signed up, but doubt if many of them are really my target market. Several of them had enough trouble reading the rules to figure out how to enter.
I am planning on becoming more active posting on forums at Kiplingers.com, Fool.com and other personal finance and debt forums. I had already decided I was going to setup a minimum entry requirement. I felt the cash would be of more use than a product (unless I did something like a Free course from a high profile professional like Dave Ramsey, etc.) The problem with that is I then isolate those that have no desire for that product. Everyone can use cash.