OK, I don’t like to get caught promoting a company or product besides my own — and I hope I do that rarely — but still, I can’t resist Intuit’s Small Business Big Wishes promotion going on right now. It ties into social media engagement, small business, and even the holiday season. Write about your business wish, win the vote, and win a $5,000 grant.
It’s one winner a day for … (quoting the rules):
… a wish that Sponsor [Intuit] is legally able to grant and is reasonably feasible to grant for your small business (that is valued at approximately $5,000 or less) and how it will transform your business in five hundred (500) characters or fewer.
And it’s neatly designed to develop Intuit in social media. To win, aside from your 500-character text, you also have to …
…visit www.loveourlocalbusiness.com and sign into one of your social networking sites, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or Google +.
And …
You will also be required to complete a registration form including your first and last name, email address, business name, and other details about your small business.
So look at what this promotion does:
- It addresses a specific target market: Small business.
- It motivates people in that target market to take engage over social media.
- It gets attention (I’m posting about it; you’re reading that post).
- It connects them with specific target market businesses.
I suggest you think about how you might apply the same kind of thinking to your own business and its presence in social media. Maybe you can’t afford the $5,000 per day that Intuit is investing, so offer something you can afford that interests your target market. And give that away for social media engagement, including names and contact information.
Very slick.
Tim Berry is the founder and chairman of Palo Alto Software and Bplans.com. Follow him on Twitter @Timberry.
