9 Hottest Summer Contest Ideas to Boost Brand Awareness

Looking for summer contest ideas that actually get results? Summer is one of the best times to connect with your audience, boost your brand visibility, and drive more sales. People are more active, sharing photos, and looking for fun activities, which makes it the perfect season to run a giveaway.

In this guide, I’ll share 9 proven summer contest ideas you can use to grow your social media following, build your email list, and engage your customers. Each idea is beginner-friendly and works for any type of business.

Quick Look: Here are the summer contest ideas covered in this guide:

How to Run a Summer Giveaway Contest

You can run a summer contest entirely on social media, but hosting it on your WordPress website gives you more control, more entry options, and the ability to grow your email list at the same time.

Here’s a quick 5-step plan to get started:

• Pick your prize and theme. Choose something your audience wants that ties into the summer season.
• Set your rules and entry methods. Make them clear, fair, and easy to follow.
• Create your giveaway page. Use a tool like RafflePress to build a branded contest page in minutes.
• Promote everywhere. Share it on social media, send to your email list, and add it to your website.
• Engage and follow up. Respond to participants during the contest and announce the winner publicly.

With RafflePress, you can add verified actions for Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, and more, so your summer giveaway reaches multiple platforms at once. Plus, built-in fraud protection keeps entries fair and genuine.

For a more detailed walkthrough, see my guide on how to run an online contest.

Best Summer Contest Ideas

The most successful summer contests start with a strong idea. If you’re out of inspiration, here are some of the hottest summer giveaway ideas you can adapt for your business.

1. Beach Moments Summer Video Contest

Who doesn’t love some summer fun on the beach?

Your audience will likely be following suit with a beachside vacation over the summer period. You can tap into the summer vibe by running a video contest for the chance to win some summer swag.

Ask your audience to send in videos of their best beach moments, such as sandcastle building, surfing the waves, or even hanging out with family in the sun. You can enter each submission into a prize draw and reward the most creative video with the grand prize.

Check out this example from Blue Planet Surf. They asked users to upload a summer video for the chance to win a giveaway prize of $2000.

RafflePress’s custom giveaway action is an excellent way to run your summer video contest. You can customize the Invent Your Own action and ask users to post their video link to enter.

2. Branded Summer Hashtag Contest

Hashtag contests are another popular giveaway idea for summer, promoting brand awareness on social media. Giveaways like this are easy to run because the entry criteria involve minimal effort.

Take Metropole South Beach, for example.

Their summer giveaway asked users to follow their Instagram account, like the giveaway post, and share it using the hashtag #metropolesouthbeach. The prize was a 4-day stay in their hotel.

To run a similar summer contest, you can use RafflePress’s Viral Refer-a-Friend giveaway action. It allows participants to share your giveaway on Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Twitter, and Email.

You can customize the share message for each platform and include your branded hashtag to increase awareness.

3. Local Event Summer Selfie Contest

There are bound to be local events taking place over the summer. Your business can tap into the event hype by running a selfie contest.

In this example, Liverpool City Council invited users to take a selfie at each of the city’s locations for the chance to win various prizes. It’s an excellent way to promote local businesses while helping users enjoy their day out.

You can run this type of contest with RafflePress’s Submit an Image action. Users can upload a selfie directly to your WordPress website to qualify. You can also ask users to join your email list with the Join an Email Newsletter action.

4. Summer Fashion Photo Contest Idea

Summer is one of the best seasons for showing off your favorite outfits. Inspire your audience by hosting a summer style photo contest, rewarding contestants with the chance to win gift cards for their favorite fashion brands. 

That’s what Sequin NYC did in this example. They partnered with a complimentary brand giving users the chance to win a stunning dress and earrings combo.

To enter, users had to post a photo on Instagram with their brand hashtag and follow both brands’ profiles.

You can follow suit by using RafflePress’s Submit an Image action. You can also boost your Instagram engagement by including bonus actions to view your Instagram profile and your Instagram post.

5. Summer Activity Bundle Sweepstakes

Sweepstakes are the easiest contests to run. They require minimal effort to enter, and you can tailor them to any theme you like by choosing a high-quality prize.

In Vtech’s sweet summertime sweepstakes, users could enter to win promotional products from their range of children’s toys. They also chose the winners randomly to ensure everyone had a fair chance of winning.

You can choose giveaway winners randomly with RafflePress’s random winner picker. When your giveaway is over, simply click the “Choose Winner Now” link, and it will pick a winner randomly from your pool of qualifying entries.

6. Summer Cooking & Recipe Contest

Does your audience love to get creative in the kitchen? Let them unleash their creativity by cooking up a storm with a summer recipe contest.

You can run this type of contest by asking participants to share their favorite recipes in the comments to win promotional items. RafflePress’s Leave a Comment action is ideal because it only takes a few clicks to enter.

Alternatively, you can get users to post a quick TikTok video of how they did it. Use the Invent Your Own action in RafflePress and ask users to post the link to their TikTok video to qualify.

You can also add bonus entries to follow you on TikTok and other social media platforms for more chances to win.

7. Summer Reading & Book Review Contest

If your audience includes a crowd of voracious readers, you can get them involved in a summer book review contest. Whether they’re relaxing by the pool or traveling, you can ask users to choose a book from their summer reading list and review it for the chance to win promotional gifts.

Toppsta ran a summer book review contest for kids to win up to £3000 in book tokens. They even had a review pack that kids could download.

Don’t have the budget for such a grand prize idea? Don’t worry!

With RafflePress, you can easily run a book review giveaway for any budget. One of the best ways to do it is with the Write a Blog Post giveaway action. Participants can publish the review on their own blog and post the link in your giveaway widget for the chance to win.

You can reward the lucky winner with a bundle of best-selling books or an Amazon gift card.

8. Backyard Makeover Summer Contest

Summer is the best time of year to get your green thumb out and make some garden improvements. Why not use the good weather to inspire your audience with a garden makeover contest.

You can ask contestants to create a Pinterest board of their dream garden or challenge them to transform their garden and submit a photo of the results.

Robert’s Nursery took the latter idea, asking users to send a photo for the chance to win $10,000.

If you’re going down the Pinterest route, don’t forget to ask participants to follow you on Pinterest for an extra chance to win.

9. Summer Caption This Photo Contest

Last up is a summer contest idea anyone can join. Choose a summer-themed photo relevant to your brand and ask participants to create a funny caption.

Telus International Philippines did that in this example. Participants had to create a fun and friendly caption matching their summer-themed critter. The prizes included an iPod shuffle, branded t-shirts, and other promotional items.

Use the Answer a Question action in RafflePress to run your caption contest. For example, you can ask, “What is your caption” and users can enter their response for the chance to win.

FAQs About Summer Contests

RafflePress and Your Small Business

Summer only lasts a few months, so make the most of it with a viral giveaway campaign. Start your summer contest with RafflePress today and watch your audience grow.

For more small business tips, check out our blog. Here are a few of our favorite relevant posts:

• 9 Father’s Day Giveaway Ideas Your Customers Will Love
• How to Use Contest Marketing to Grow Your Business
• 15+ Best Promotional Giveaways to Easily Market Your Brand

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