So if we were to take a peep inside the mind of the average sweeper, I bet that before we peel back that page to the centerfold of desire for prizes and validation for things with minimal work, we’d find an easy-to-scan list of turn ons and turn offs regarding entering promotions.

And as it just so happens, the About.com has a great Contest & Sweeps site that has asked sweepers just that very question.  I think you’ll find it surprising [besides the spelling] how unsurprising the answers really are.  Many of the comments involve sweepstakes entries in exchange for magazine subscriptions…  this isn’t the type of promotion most of us are talking about, so let’s just skip those comments.

What attracts sweepers to a particular promotion?

•  Prizes that easily be used or turned over.
  •  Cash, Cars, Computers, stuff like that
• Entry forms that are very, very easy to fill out, so easy that they can use automated software.
•  Just having a sweepstakes or reveal-style game.

What’s a sweeper’s turn-off?

•  When the promotion is obviously geared to a specific target audience and well qualified as such that will require any thought or stoppage by them beyond this: Go, CLICK, Submit. 
  •  Peppered throughout this article are signs that the average sweeper does not like to all of the things that would naturally be attractive to the audience you could be building the program to attract and hold the attention of such as:
  • Fill out forms manually [OK, no one really likes this, but no one hates it THIS much]
  • Provide personal information beyond what is immediately necessary

• Play games or engage in content that may be relevant to a target audience.

• When the promotion is geared towards participants with access to high speed broadband.
  • Not to invoke the digital divide, but one of the #1 complaints in these comments is regarding load times.  The inference of that is that most of those complainers, and .: a fair number of sweepers, are still accessing the internet from dial-up or lower bandwidth connections.  So, if you punch up the creative and the content, you may create a natural barrier while doing what you would naturally do to increase the attractiveness and stickiness for the core target.
  • Coincidentally, call back to our Customer Service people have discerned that less than 1% of overall complaints lodged to us are regarding load times.

• When the promotion is too well promoted and supported by [relevant] advertising.
  •  A sweeper is often fully aware that a promotion is a numbers game.  The more entrants, the less the chance is of winning.  So a very well supported promotion will have a lot of entries, or acquisitions for the brand, but will lessen a sweepers chance at the prize(s). 

• When the promotion goes on too long.
  •  Sweepers want prizes.  Sweepers want prizes now.  They don’t want to wait 12 months to find out about them.  Now, your average consumer will also feel fatigue about a promotion if it’s going to go on interminably, but this does provide insight.

• When the prize itself has an inconvenient tax burden.
  • Average entrants will not think about this.  But a sweeper will.  Cash is cash.  A $1,000 gift card is essentially a $1,000 gift card forcing the winner to reserve about @ $400 to support the tax burden in the next calendar year.  A $50,000 car is a significant tax burden, especially of the rules do not provide the sponsor the out to allow the prize to be issued as cash instead, or the prize to be transferred. 

• When there is too much viral sharing of the promotion.
  • Sharing with friends is too much work
  •  The more people a sweeper enters may be more entries for them, but it is also more competition in the prize pool, too.

This is a perfect summary from one entrant:

    1. If I have to spend a half hour figuring out the instructions in the first place(usually how to play a game), it's not worth it to me. 2. If there is annoying or stupid animation (M&Ms comes to mind). 3. If everybody in the world is probably entering it (ex: Oprah contests). 4 If there are too many screens to negotiate...I almost didn't go ahead with the current Coke (Twist TXT) contest because there it was so confusing to get started - however, with a winner promised every 5 minutes for the rest of the year(!), I decided it would be worth spending the time to figure it out - - which paid off in 2 free movie tickets and $20 for the month of May! So it depends on the prizes.

—raymondlover2

So there you have it, in their own words. The things smart marketers are doing to make their promotions smarter, more targeted, more integrated with all marketing and advertising, and more social are the same things that are by their very nature making them less attractive to the sweeper segment.

Yet, just throwing up a $5,000 drawing as an add-on is sweeper heaven.

Melissa totally found this original article.

Photo by astrangegirl . She’s  reading it for the articles, I’m sure.