How to run an internal contest to grow your digital list

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A small cataloger offered its employees $700 a month, and a grand prize of $5000. The rules were simple – every month the rep to collect the maximum number of digital ids won $400, second place was $200, third place $100. The rep with the most collected over the course of the year received $5000.

Of course, there was a catch, there was a group goal. The rep only got the $5000 if the group goal was met. Everyone worked hard together; there were training meetings and “rah-rah” sessions. The program was advertised to the reps via email. Not their work email but their personal email.

The program cost $21,000, they had 30 seats and 92 employees over the course of a year. They collected 564,615 legitimate email addresses at 0.26 cents per… 32 employees earned the incentives, the call center was transformed but the customers were the ultimate winners.

I have seen the same approach work with a credit union. Their member base was over 200,000. They had 12,000 email addresses. A systematic incentive program like the above has them with more than 80,000 email addresses and more than 40,000 members signed up for e-statements.

Education, empowerment and getting selling your employees will drive longer term benefits rather than running specials for customers.