Over the years, I’ve seen a lot of complaints about Facebook, the privacy restrictions, and how they own your photos and content, and how they are akin to Big Brother.  Frankly, it never really bothered me.  But now, I must admit I’m starting to get a bit annoyed.  Here’s why.

I have some clients who have decided to run some contests in order to engage their fans and get them excited about their page.  That’s good right?  I mean, some of these pages have less than 100 fans and it’s a great way to attract more attention.  How hard can it be?  “Post here who you think will win American Idol, and we’ll draw a winner at random.”  It should be fairly simple.

New Guidelines

Except that Facebook recently came out with some new guidelines about promotions.  Officially, they claim they haven’t created any new rules, but rather just clarified their current policies.  In some ways, Facebook has loosened the reins a bit… in 2009, if you wanted to run a contest, you had to consult with Facebook first and get their permission.  And if any of you have ever tried to contact Facebook and get a response, you know you’re more likely to find Jimmy Hoffa.

Don’t get me wrong… I love Facebook, and I love that I get paid to work on Facebook.  But the bottom line is that businesses cannot run any contests without using a 3rd party contest application.  You can’t even offer a prize to fans who have clicked “Like” on a post.

Facebook claims this is all being done to ensure clear ethics, to make certain that scammers and spammers don’t get the upper hand.  (As a former paralegal, I recognize a “CYA” move when I see it: this ensures that Facebook has absolutely no liability when it comes to any contest or sweepstakes results, and can’t get sued.)  I suppose there are good intentions behind Facebook’s clarifications… protecting the consumer from scams.  Nonetheless, this can cause headaches for small businesses.

Third Party Contest Apps

You might ask, “so what’s the big deal?  I’ll just use a 3rd party app… no problem.”  That was my initial response too.  But it’s a problem because almost none of these apps are free.  Mari Smith wrote this fabulous article about Facebook promotions, in which she explains all of the rules and suggests several 3rd party providers for Facebook contests (it should be required reading for all social media professionals).  I’ve gone through this entire list, and even though some of them may advertise that they are “free”, most of them only offer a “free trial”, or they offer free contests if you have a certain number of fans.  

Offerpop.com looks like it genuinely does offer free promotions for those with a lower number of fans. However, they don’t seem to have a free version of what I want to use the most for my clients… content based contests.  For example, your company wants your fans to tell you why their dad is the greatest… and you’ll choose a winner at random and offer a Father’s Day prize.  Nope, there’s no app for that from Offerpop. 

NorthSocial appears to offer a fairly reasonable option… $19.99 a month and you get ALL of their apps (not just the Sweepstakes app), and you can run as many contests as you want.  Again, it doesn’t seem to offer a “content based contest” app.  So when I run contests for my clients, it looks like we’re going to try Wildfire.  They do offer that kind of app, and the cost seems fairly low for a barebones campaign… $5 per contest, and $.99 per day.  Essentially, you could run a contest for 10 days for about $15.  I’ve seen some complaints about Wildfire, but I’m willing to try it out myself.

The end result, however, is that it is nearly impossible for small businesses to run contests without paying extra money.  

Big Brother is Watching You

You may say, “hey, I’ve got a small business with less than 100 fans.  Is this really necessary? How is Facebook going to know what I’m doing on my dinky little page?”  I’m not somebody who tries to bend the rules, but this is probably true… with millions of fanpages out there, it’s nearly impossible for Facebook to police every contest.  But do you want to risk it?  It’s not like they first send you a warning notice… they could literally just shut you down.  And THEN, just try reaching them to get it turned on again.  Jimmy Hoffa might be more accessible.

Oh yes, and don’t forget… you can’t use your Facebook wall or Facebook email to announce winners, although you CAN use your 3rd party app to give the name of your winner.  I really disagree with this policy… shouldn’t Facebook be encouraging businesses to use their walls (and therefore, their newsfeeds) to engage their fans?  And what if you don’t have the email address of the winning fan, even though you’re required to notify them through regular email?  I suggest that collecting the fan’s email address should be a best practice when administering a contest using a 3rd party app   Again, this policy is completely a CYA move by Facebook, which makes me wonder how many times Facebook has been sued about contest results.

After I’ve used some of these apps in contests for my customers, I will report back and offer my results. In the meantime, try not to tempt Big Brother… you could end up with some very undesirable results!