5 Types of Instagram Contests that Win Hearts and Increase Sales

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These last few years, Instagram has been a prominent platform for photo sharing, both for those who leisurely do and those who market their brand or wish to elevate their sales. Instagram has grown into an immensely effective tool with its 400 million active users per month and 40 billion photos shared in less than 6 years, which many take advantage to gain new viewers and engage their existing followers.

With its massive number of users, you could easily get lost and be unknown amidst the crowd. However, one of the most effective ways to gain new followers is through contests and as Instagram doesn’t have as many promotion limitations as other platforms, you could get as creative as possible with the concept.

1. Like Contests

This is the easiest kind of contests to hold. All you need to do is ask participants to like one or maybe more of your photos in order to enter and receive the possibility to win the prize. The goal of this kind of contest is the engagement that people have with your account.

Once users like your picture, the probability that your picture will show up in their followers’ discover feed will be higher. This automatically increases your exposure to other users that you previously never know before.

2. Follow Contest

Similar to the Like contest, users have to follow your account in order to be counted into the competition. The goal of this contest is of course the followers count, and consequently will create more viewers on your subsequent pictures even after the competition ends.

And again, with more people following you, the chance of your profile or picture emerge in their followers’ discover page will also increase.

3. Repost Contest

In order to gain entry, participants must repost one or more photos. This picture can be a particular one which is related to the contest or any picture from your feed. You should remind participants to tag you in their reposted picture so that you can trace whoever has entered the contest.

As more people repost your photos, then your photos can reach more of their followers. When more people see the picture that they repost, it will give you exposure and there’s a possibility that some of them might actually check out your account, and become your future followers.

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4. Most Likes Contest

This can be perceived as one of the most user active contests. You can ask participants to post a certain type of picture or repost an existing one from your profile and the one with the most likes will be the winner.

Participants will have to ask their inner circle of friends to help liking their photo or ask their friends to tag their other friends, too. This kind of contest will indirectly force them to introduce you to their peers and as the result, will gain you more viewers. However, in order to emerge a competitive enough environment for participants, you need to be careful with the prize that you provide.

Remember that it has to be interesting enough to make participants willingly take part in the contest, and it must also relate to the service or product that your brand stands for.

5. Challenge Contest 

This may be the most popular and most creative type of contest in Instagram. Tell users to post a certain photo on their personal account with specific hashtag and your Instagram account.

You can innovate a challenge as interesting as possible which not only will provoke other users to participate but it should also incorporate your brand name, product, store, or your campaign.

Marc Jacobs took his model recruiting to a new level when he announced the #CastMeMarc in his account.

Applebees ran the #Fantographer campaign where they asked customers to take interesting photos of their food and get featured in Applebees official account. Through this campaign, Applebees increased their followers by 32 % and engagement by 25 %.


These are only some ideas on how to conduct Instagram contest, while on the reality, there’s no actual boundary on how you should do it. Content and creativity must also be taken into account. An engaging theme combined with interesting content will definitely raise the name of your brand and products.