Contest Domination

What do you like best?

A former New York Marketing Professional and current University Professor, my agency recommended and implemented sweepstakes and contents for many years.

We always engaged the services of outside consultants for implementation since the logistics, as well as the state-by-state laws and regulations that apply to contests and sweeps are tedious and ever-changing.

Unlike most professors at the universities for which I teach, and have taught, I prefer not teaching out of a textbook. Texts about Internet Marketing, eCommerce, SEO, and the like are out of date the day they're printed.

And because I know the majority of students attend colleges and universities to "get a better job," I feel it's my responsibility to help them walk the path to a good job in the workplace. (Higher education has never claimed "workplace readiness." Their primary deliverable is "critical thinking," and, more broadly, "academics.")

I've been teaching "Internet Marketing" since 1995--at a time when there was no such thing!

By university mandate, I adopted a textbook but made no assignments from it. I joined New York's Silicon Valley Association and befriended the brilliant young people who were receiving funding just before the Internet Bubble had burst.

In the early 2000s, I began establishing websites at my expense (the sites were small businesses but too small for a university to dedicate resources.) As for my small businesses, I had a heightened interest. But I had the guidance and advice of many brilliant young MBA's who were current with evolving technologies and when combined with my advanced understanding of the marketing disciplines, we built strong selling strategies.

I also had a built-in cadre of guest speakers--young men & women from the "real world" who could share their knowledge and projects with my classes.

Next semester, I'm planning to introduce and incorporate Contest Domination into the curriculum. The ability to automate such powerful and complex promotional tactics into the marketing mix will make them as attainable to smaller organizations as they are to larger entities.

What do you dislike?

For me, there's a learning curve. But considering once you learn to configure Contest Domination, it's easy to do again.

If you don't like using contests to promote you won't care for this software. But that's something I can't imagine.

What problems are you solving with the product? What benefits have you realized?

Traffic, customers, and list building, all at the same time.