How to Run a Video Contest in 2026 (12 Expert Steps)
Stacey Corrin
Stacey Corrin
John Turner
John Turner
TL;DR: How to Run a Video Contest (Step-by-Step Guide)
Running a video contest can drive serious engagement, but only if you set it up right. Here are the key steps:
- Set goals — decide whether you want subscribers, UGC, email signups, or brand awareness before you plan anything else.
- Survey your audience — find out what prize they actually want, then build the theme around it.
- Write clear guidelines — cover eligibility, video format, submission method, and winner selection upfront.
- Choose your platform — use a dedicated tool like RafflePress to collect entries and prevent fraud automatically.
- Promote before and during — start teasing 7 days before launch; share on every channel where your audience lives.
- Track and repurpose — measure entry-to-view rate, email growth, and shares, then reuse the best submissions in future campaigns.
You’ve watched other brands run video contests that explode on YouTube and TikTok. Yours got twelve entries and a handful of confused comments about how to submit a video.
The gap usually isn’t the idea. It’s the setup. A video contest needs clear rules, the right platform, and a promotion plan that starts before you go live.
In this guide, I’ll show you how to run a video competition in 12 steps using RafflePress. Most setups take 2 to 3 days of active work, with a 1 to 2 week promotion window before launch.
How to Run a Video Contest
Wondering how to do a video contest yourself? Follow the tips for creating a video contest below to learn how:
- 1. Set Clear Video Contest Goals
- 2. Survey Your Audience for Video Contest Ideas
- 3. Offer Video Contest Prizes People Want
- 4. Create a Fun Video Contest Theme
- 5. Create Clear Video Contest Guidelines
- 6. Build a Buzz Before Launching
- 7. Choose a Reliable Giveaway Platform
- 8. Add Your Video Contest to a Giveaway Landing Page
- 9. Promote Your Video Contest on Social Media
- 10. Make Choosing a Winner Super-Simple
- 11. Engage with Contestants and Repurpose Their Content
- 12. Track Your Video Contest Results to Make Improvements
1. Set Clear Video Contest Goals
It’s hard to create an online contest without setting goals. Goals help you determine your success and measure the results after the contest is over.
For example, you might decide to run a video competition to:
- Drive traffic to your website
- Increase your YouTube subscribers
- Boost brand awareness
- Build your podcast audience
- Generate more sales
- Collect video submissions for UGC
- Grow your email list subscribers
- Get more followers on social media
- Create a buzz around a new product or service
Choose a goal that aligns with your business and marketing motivations. Once you have a plan, running your giveaway campaign is much easier, and you’ll get the results you need.
2. Survey Your Audience for Video Contest Ideas
When you plan a video contest, it’s important to think about what your audience likes. If you don’t know what they want, it’s hard to offer a prize they’ll be excited about.
Before you start your contest, ask your audience what kind of prize they’d love. eCommerce sites could send an email survey to recent customers, bloggers can create an online survey for filmmakers and add it to a blog post, and YouTubers can run a video poll.
Once you know what your audience likes, you can pick a great prize for your contest. We’ll talk about choosing prizes next.
3. Offer Video Contest Prizes People Want
The prize you offer is really important for your video contest. If people don’t like the prize, they won’t bother to enter. So, use what you learned from asking your audience to choose a great prize.
Some of the most popular contest prize ideas include:
- Free products or services
- Discounts and coupons
- Gift cards and gift certificates
- Cash prizes
- Prize bundles
Check out our complete list of contest prize ideas for more inspiration.
You’ll also want to ensure your prize is relevant to your target audience and brand. Silo Fit App offered a bundle of fitness goodies in this video contest example.
If you choose a prize your ideal customers really want, more of them will join your online video competition. This means you’ll get more entries from the people you most want to reach.
Budget Considerations for Your Video Contest
Before committing to a prize, it helps to map out your total contest costs. Most video contests have three spending areas: the prize itself, your contest platform, and promotion.
For the platform, RafflePress uses a one-time annual payment model starting around $49/year. Alternatives like Gleam charge a recurring monthly subscription, which adds up over time.
Prizes range from $50 product bundles to $500+ cash prizes, depending on your audience size and goals. Promotion can be entirely organic (social posts, email list, existing audience) or supplemented with paid ads.
I’ve seen small brands run successful video submission contests for under $200 total. The prize matters far more than the budget size, as long as it’s genuinely relevant to your audience.
4. Create a Fun Video Contest Theme
Having a theme for your video contest is a great idea. It makes the contest more fun and interesting.
Here are some fun video contest themes for inspiration:
- Make a challenge like the Ice Bucket Challenge
- Ask people to make lip-syncing videos
- Have a TikTok dance contest
- Get people to make a trailer for your product or event
- Ask for makeup tutorials
- Run a video editing competition
- Ask for unboxing videos of your product
- Have a music video contest
With a video app in their hands, you’ll be surprised how creative people can be and how popular a fun UGC contest can get.
Remember, you can look online for more video contest ideas if you need inspiration. The right theme can make your contest exciting and get more people to join in.
5. Create Clear Video Contest Guidelines
Another critical step is setting out your video contest rules and regulations. Will people have to submit a video for a chance to win, or will they have to share the contest on social media to enter?
Beyond that, you need to be crystal clear about how they enter and what kind of video they should create. This will help avoid confusion and ensure a smooth contest experience.
Here’s what your guidelines should cover:
- Who Can Enter: Age limits (18+?), location (US only?), employees allowed?
- Video Topic: What should the video be about? Give examples. Any off-limit topics?
- Video Length: Keep it short and sweet. Set a time limit (e.g., 30 seconds to 2 minutes).
- Video Format: What file types (MP4, MOV)? Minimum resolution (720p)? Royalty-free music only?
- How to Enter: Upload to YouTube and share the link? Send the video directly? Use a hashtag?
- Choosing a Winner: Random draw? Judges? Public vote? Explain the process.
- Prizes: What can they win? Any restrictions?
- Using the Videos: Will you share them online? Get permission.
- Other Important Rules: Be as detailed as possible.
Here’s an example to get you started
Show Your [Your Brand] Style” Video Contest Guidelines:
- Who: Open to US residents, 18+. No employees of [Your Company].
- What: Create a video showing how you use [Your Product]. Be creative! No offensive content.
- Length: 30 seconds to 1 minute.
- Tech Specs: MP4 format, 720p minimum. Royalty-free music only.
- Submit: Upload to YouTube, share the link in the contest entry form on [Your Website], and use #ShowYour[Brand]Style.
- Winner: Chosen by our team based on creativity and relevance to the theme.
- Prize: A year’s supply of [Your Product]!
- Video Use: We may share your video on our social media and website.
Legal Requirements for Video Contests
Your guidelines also need to cover legal ground, especially for larger-prize contests. The key requirements most brands overlook are an official rules document, prize disclosure (fair market value), and eligibility restrictions by jurisdiction.
Platform rules add another layer. YouTube prohibits requiring likes, subscriptions, or comments as entry conditions. TikTok and Instagram have similar restrictions on follower-gating entries. Violating these can get your contest removed.
For contests with prizes over $600, consult a lawyer familiar with sweepstakes law. For smaller contests, using a clear official rules template and following each platform’s contest policy page covers most situations.
6. Build a Buzz Before Launching
Before launching your video competition, you need to build anticipation in your followers. Generating a buzz for your giveaway gets people excited and eager to enter and makes it more likely you’ll attract more entries when the contest is live.
The best way to build anticipation is to release a series of teaser updates on your online video platform of choice. Here’s a timeline you can use for inspiration:
- 7 days before launch: Mention your contest in your regular video slot.
- 5 days before launch: Create a video dedicated to talking about your contest.
- Every day until launch: Finish your videos with a call to check out your giveaway announcement video when it launches.
You can also share your prelaunch announcements on your other social media channels to encourage maximum participation when you publish your contest. If you plan to use referral entries, setting up a refer-a-friend giveaway during this phase can amplify your reach before day one.
7. Choose a Reliable Giveaway Platform
The right contest software makes the difference between a smooth launch and a logistical headache. Rather than piecing together different tools and hoping for the best, use a dedicated giveaway platform built for this.
Some popular free online contest platforms include Rafflecopter, Woobox, and Sweepwidget. But the tool I always recommend is RafflePress.
RafflePress is a WordPress giveaway plugin that collects YouTube video URLs as entries automatically. There’s no manual tracking, no spreadsheets, and no chasing down submissions. The refer-a-friend action means every entrant becomes a promoter, growing your pool without extra spend.
For YouTube-specific contests, RafflePress includes native entry actions that let participants submit a video URL, subscribe to your channel, or watch a specific video as separate entry steps. Each action is tracked and validated automatically, so you’re not manually verifying entries or worrying about duplicate accounts gaming your contest.
This guide teaches you how to run a giveaway in WordPress with RafflePress.
8. Add Your Video Contest to a Giveaway Landing Page
When you’re ready to publish your contest, the best place to do so is on a dedicated giveaway landing page.
If you were to host your giveaway on video platforms like YouTube and Vimeo, it would be easy for entrants to get distracted by other content. It would also be harder to track entries, making it difficult to pick a winner.
A giveaway landing page is a web page created specifically for your contest, linked to your main website. Creating one removes the distractions that prevent people from entering and makes it easier for contest builders like RafflePress to track entries all in one place.
Then, when you begin promoting your contest, all you need is to share the landing page’s URL. A giveaway landing page also helps with automation since it allows easy integration of an entry form.
9. Promote Your Video Contest on Social Media
You can’t sit and wait for people to enter your video contest, as tempting as it sounds. Instead, you need to promote it to spread the word and secure more entries. An excellent contest marketing strategy helps your contest go viral so you can grow your audience and get tons of new leads.
There are plenty of ways to promote your video contest, but the easiest way is to share it on social media networks like Facebook, X (formerly Twitter), and Instagram and ask people to tag a friend in the comments to raise awareness.
You can also promote your contest with the following methods:
- Add a link to your website’s homepage
- Display a social media feed on your site dedicated to your giveaway posts
- Create an email newsletter with your top email marketing platform
- Add a popup to your site using OptinMonster
- Share your giveaway in a Facebook Group
- Use Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube targeting to reach specific demographics and interests with paid ads.
- Collaborate with complementary businesses to cross-promote your video contest to each other’s audiences.
- Reach out to relevant media outlets, bloggers, and journalists to generate buzz and coverage
Start promoting your video contest weeks before it goes live to get plenty of traffic and entries the day you launch. Remember to track your key metrics to understand what’s working and where to adjust your strategy.
Check out our article on more contest promotion ideas to make your giveaway viral.
Running a video contest on Instagram? Instagram-specific entries work differently from YouTube. Participants typically submit via a hashtag rather than a direct video URL link. RafflePress handles Instagram entries by asking users to follow your account or use a specific hashtag as the entry action, rather than submitting a file. Reels format performs best for organic reach, so include that guidance in your contest instructions.
10. Make Choosing a Winner Super-Simple
When you build your video contest, think about how you’ll choose the winner. There are many ways to pick a winner, some straightforward and some more complicated.
The best way to choose a winner is to keep things simple by randomly drawing a winner from all video entries. You can save precious time and give the winner the good news quickly.
Most popular giveaway tools have this option built in to make the process easy for you.
Here are a few other ways to pick a winner:
- Internal Judging Panel: For contests emphasizing specific criteria, an internal panel can review submissions and choose a winner based on a predetermined rubric. This ensures fairness and consistency in judging.
- Guest Judges: Consider inviting industry experts or influencers to judge your contest. This adds credibility and excitement to your campaign and can even attract a wider audience.
- Public Voting: Get your audience involved and let them vote for their favorite entries. You can host voting on social media platforms or embed a voting mechanism directly on your website. Just be sure to implement measures to prevent fraudulent voting.
If you use public voting, fraud is a real concern. Open voting attracts coordinated campaigns where entrants solicit votes from outside your actual audience.
A random draw is safer because it can’t be gamed. If you prefer voting, set a minimum entry threshold before an entry becomes eligible for the draw.
Use RafflePress’s built-in entry validation to filter duplicate accounts and suspicious activity before the vote count reaches your dashboard.
For help with this stage of your video contest, see our guide on how to pick a winner for a giveaway.
11. Engage with Contestants and Repurpose Their Content
Your video contest doesn’t have to end when the prizes are handed out. The period after your contest is a golden opportunity to nurture relationships with your participants and get more mileage out of the content they created.
Here are some ideas to keep the engagement going and make the most of your user-generated content:
- Showcase the Stars: Feature the winning video (and some runners-up) on your website, blog, social media channels, and in email newsletters. This gives winners well-deserved spotlight and reminds everyone how great your contest was.
- Community Building: Create a dedicated space (like a Facebook group, online forum, or hashtag) where participants can connect, share their videos, and continue the conversation around your contest theme.
- Exclusive Perks: Offer exclusive discounts, early access to new products, or special content to contest participants. This shows your appreciation and incentivizes them to stick around.
- Repurpose the Content: With permission, use the user-generated videos in future marketing campaigns, social media posts, or website content. Extract snippets or images from videos and feature them in emails or blog posts. This adds authenticity and social proof without extra production cost.
The relationships you build during and after your video contest can be as valuable as the contest itself. Learn how to announce a giveaway winner in a way that keeps your audience engaged for your next campaign.
If one of your goals was list growth, check out how to run a giveaway to grow your email list and turn contest participants into long-term subscribers.
12. Track Your Video Contest Results to Make Improvements
When your contest is over and you’ve picked a winner and figured out how to use the UGC you gathered, our last tip is to analyze your results. Then, you can run an online video competition that’s even more successful next time.
The easiest way to get the contest metrics you need to optimize your campaigns is to use MonsterInsights, the best WordPress Google Analytics plugin.
MonsterInsights makes it easy to track visits to your contest landing page, traffic to your entire website, and website activity. You can see MonsterInsights’ reports right from within your WordPress dashboard.
Here are four specific metrics worth tracking after every video contest:
- Entry-to-view conversion rate: Divide total entries by landing page visits. Below 10% usually means your prize or guidelines need work. Above 25% means your targeting is strong.
- Social shares per entry: How many entrants shared your contest link? Low share rates suggest your refer-a-friend incentive needs a bigger reward or a clearer prompt.
- Email list growth from the contest: If email signup was an entry action, how many new subscribers did you gain? Compare to your pre-contest baseline to see your real cost per subscriber.
- Video submission quality rate: What percentage of entries were usable for future content? Low quality often means the video brief was too vague. Fix it in your guidelines for next time.
By reviewing your website data with MonsterInsights, you can learn which strategies sent the most traffic to your giveaway page and use that data to improve your next giveaway. You can even use MonsterInsights’ real-time stats to monitor your site traffic during your contest and make adjustments as you go.
How to Run a Video Contest FAQs
What legal requirements do I need to follow when running a video contest?
You need an official rules document covering eligibility, prize value disclosure, and how you’ll use submitted videos. In the US, contests with prizes over $600 may require tax reporting. Each platform adds its own layer: YouTube prohibits requiring likes, subscriptions, or comments as entry conditions, and TikTok has similar restrictions. For larger-prize contests, consult a lawyer familiar with sweepstakes law in your jurisdiction.
How do I prevent fraud in public voting for a video contest?
Public voting is vulnerable to coordinated vote brigading, where entrants recruit outside audiences to flood the ballot. The safest approach is a random draw, which can’t be gamed. If you prefer voting, set a minimum entry threshold before an entry qualifies, and use RafflePress’s entry validation to filter duplicate accounts before votes are counted. Limiting votes to verified email addresses adds another layer of protection.
How long should a video contest run?
Most video contests run 2 to 4 weeks. Shorter contests (under 2 weeks) can work if you have a warm, engaged audience already. Longer contests (over 6 weeks) tend to lose momentum as people forget they entered. From what I’ve seen, a 2-week window with a strong 7-day pre-launch promotion period consistently performs better than a 4-week contest with no pre-launch buildup.
How do I collect video submissions for a contest?
The simplest method is to ask participants to upload their video to YouTube (or another platform) and submit the link through your entry form. RafflePress has a native YouTube video URL entry action that collects and validates submissions automatically. Avoid asking entrants to email you files directly — video files are large, and managing inboxes full of attachments is a fast way to lose track of entries.
What platforms can I use to host an online video contest?
Popular platforms for hosting video contests include YouTube, Vimeo, Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook. For the best results, use a dedicated WordPress giveaway plugin like RafflePress to manage entries, track submissions, and pick a winner, regardless of which video platform your participants use. This keeps all your entries in one place instead of scattered across multiple platforms.
Running a video contest is one of the most effective ways to generate authentic content, grow your audience, and build real engagement around your brand. If you’re ready to get started, try RafflePress and launch your first video submission contest today.
You might also find the following giveaway guides helpful:
- 10 YouTube Giveaway Examples to Skyrocket Your Engagement
- How to Increase YouTube Views with a Giveaway
- How to Do a Giveaway on YouTube (The Best Way)
- How To Get Subscribers On YouTube (14 Easy Hacks)
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