Organize a Video Contest to collect user-generated content that you'll be able to show in a public gallery and enable the voting system to help viralize the contest. Users can upload any video format from anywhere: mobile, tablet, Facebook, YouTube, Vimeo, Instagram or Twitter.

 

The content of the tutorial is as follows:

1. General description

2. Set up of the Video Contest

• Step 1. Create the promotion

• Paso 2. Participant registration system

• Step 3. Customize the Gallery page

• Step 4. Enable the voting (optional)

• Step 5. Enable Twitter/Instagram (optional)

3. Customize the design and finish the settings

4. Manage and publish the winners

 

1. General description

The Video Contest application will allow you to organize an online video contest to obtain content generated by your users, which you can display in a public gallery and, additionally, enable voting to help make the contest viral. The Video Contest will allow you to:

• Completely customize the registration form with the data you want to obtain from the participants.
• Accept any video format: Users can participate by uploading videos from YouTube or Vimeo, and additionally, you can enable the Video Hosting extension to allow users to upload any video file directly from their device.
• Publicly display the videos uploaded by users in the contest gallery and enable the voting system so that the videos can be voted.
• Enable participation from Twitter/Instagram to facilitate participation from these two social networks.
• Manage and moderate all video uploaded by users in order to control which videos appear published in the gallery and are valid for the contest.
• Decide how you want to determine the winner/s of the contest: by votes, through a jury or by a random draw.
• Download the videos uploaded by users by connecting your Dropbox account

 

2. Set up of the Video contest

Here we explain all the steps to create your Video contest.

 

Step 1. Create the promotion

1. Access the Easypromos Control Panel and log in with your email address and password to manage and create your promotions.

 

2. Create a new promotion via the green button.

 

3. You will be presented with a list of the products available. Choose ‘Video contest’ to create a promotion that lets users submit their videos and display them in a public gallery.

4. As a next step, set up the following options:

• Organizing brand. As a first step, you should select or create an organizing brand for your promotion. This organizing brand is independent of any social network and works as a folder within your Easypromos account, in order to help organize the promotions that you create.
• Template version. Select which template you want to use to create your promotion: Premium or White Label.

Note: Compare here the features and functionalities included in each template.

5. After clicking on "Continue" button, you'll get access to the promotion management page, where you have all the options for configuring the promotion. We outline the most important sections below:

1. Header. This displays the promotion title, the platform version and other relevant information such as the promotion ID number. You'll also see the promotion status: Draft, Active or Expired, as well as if it’s about to start. Once the promotion period has ended, this field will be marked in red saying: Status: Expired. You can choose what you want to show on an expired promotion page.
2. Link to the promotion. You should use this URL every time you share the promotion. You'll also see the copy link button, which instantly copies the link to make sharing easier.
3. Activate Promotion. When the promotion is ready to launch, click this button to activate it. You'll be taken to the activation page, where you can review billing information and make payments.
4. Test mode. This tool will allow you to carry out a real test of the promotion before activating it, in order to participate in it as users will when it is activated and thus be able to check that the promotion works as expected before launching it. More information.
5. Side menu. All your promotion settings in one place.
6. View tutorial. This tutorial guides you step by step through the creation and management of your promotion.
7. Promotion dates and timezone, as well as language settings.
   Languages indicates the default language of the promotion. You can change this if you wish.
   Localization limits participation to one or several countries. More information here.
8. Next steps: Practical recommendations that will guide you in the creation and management of your campaign.

Tip: the promotion ID number (#) is a unique identifier for each promotion. Quote this number to the Easypromos support team if you have any issues. This will make it easier for us to review your settings and help you out.

 

Step 2. Participant registration system

In order to participate in the Video Contest, users must register by filling in the registration form with the requested data.

To do this, go to the Editor > Pages > Registration Form, to customize the fields that you want to ask users to be able to participate:

 

Because you've selected the “video contest” app, the "Media" field is pre-configured to ask participants for a video entry. By default, users can link a YouTube or Vimeo URL to this field.

Important: By default, Video Contests only allow users to participate with videos previously hosted on Youtube and Vimeo. They simply insert the URL of the video in the Media field of the registration form.

If you want to allow participants to upload a video file directly from their mobile or computer, you must enable the "Video Hosting Extension", which has an additional cost of $99 (price per contest). The extension will be added to the cost of activating the contest.

To enable the Video Hosting extension, follow these steps:

1. Click on the "Enable" button:

2. A pop-up window will open to confirm that you want to enable the extension:

3. The extension will be enabled, and the cost will appear on the purchase summary page:

When you enable the Video Hosting extension, the platform will suggest connecting a Dropbox account for safe and convenient file storage. If you connect to Dropbox, videos will be automatically stored on your account. You'll find them in a folder named Easypromos, followed by your promotion ID number.

You can configure advanced options, such as:

• Allow users to participate with a photo or a video.
• Make uploading a photo or video optional.

If you want to enable a field for video captions or details, you can add the "Comments field". Participants will be able to write up to 65.000 characters, but you can choose to limit captions with the "Maximum characters allowed" option.

Check the tutorial where we explain how to configure the promotion registration form.

 

Step 3. Customize the Gallery page

Set up how the public gallery of entries will be displayed. In this section, you should focus on the following option tabs:

1. Contents: From here, you can upload a header image and add an introductory message to give the gallery a more corporate touch.

2. Layout: By default, the gallery uses a tiled layout. This allows you to present more than one picture on the same line, and makes for a visually attractive collage. In this section you will find the following configuration options:

• Decide if you want to use the Tiled gallery or the Vertical gallery.
• Adjust the details of the gallery design. Find out how here.

Note: You can enable pre-moderation so that the entries are not published automatically but remain as pending so that you can review them before.

3. Options: Here you have the following advanced options:

• Entries per page. This option allows to set up the number of pictures displayed per page within the Gallery.
• Order entries. This option allows to set up how you want the pictures to be ordered on the Gallery:
  • Most recent first.
  • Randomly.
  • Most voted first.
• Anonymous participations. Activate this if you don’t want to display users' names and Facebook profiles next to their competition entries in the gallery.

 

Step 4. Enable the voting system (optional)

Access the "Votes" tab if you want users to vote on entries.

By default, Video Contests come with the voting system enabled. In this section, you’ll be able to set up what type of voting system you wish to have in your contest. You can also disable the voting system from here.

 

Step 5. Enable participation via Twitter and Instagram (optional)

Normally, users participate by accessing the promotion and filling in the entry form. If you want to allow Twitter and Instagram users to participate from within their social networks, you can enable Twitter and Instagram integration. Users can then participate by posting with the mention+hashtag that you've picked for the contest.

 

3. Customize the design and finish the settings

Once you have configured the Video contest, the next step is to finish the configuration of the other options of the promotion, such as customizing the design template with your own colors and texts, introducing the legal bases, the viral content settings, etc. Check the tutorial to finish the configuration and customization of your promotion.

 

4. Manage and publish the winners

Easypromos provides a complete Prize and Winners Management system that will allow you to create the prize or prizes that you want to give to the users who participate in the contest, as well as configure how you want to assign the prizes and select the winners.

Specifically, for the Video Contest you have two ways to assign the prize to the winners, according to your choice:

 

1. Randomly: You can run one or more draw among participants, or among a segment of participants, and obtain a certificate of validity with the results. Follow the steps of this tutorial to run the draw.

2. Manually: You can assign one or more prizes manually to your chosen winners. This is useful in voting contests and skills tests. We also recommend this option if your winners are selected by a jury, notary public, or the organizing brand. Follow the steps of this tutorial to assign the prizes manually.

Learn how to create prizes and select winners in the Prize management tutorial.