we have seen that there’s no better place to hold a contest than the social web.
Like a lot of things on the web, contests too are viral. If they catch on, they spread like wildfire. Now, could there be a more viral medium than YouTube? So it is, that YouTube and contests come together to give participating viewers a chance to walk away with some cool prizes.
How do you find the YouTube contests to play in and which ones are the coolest? The first is rather easy; the second is your pick. But here’s the first step.
Like a lot of things on the web, contests too are viral. If they catch on, they spread like wildfire. Now, could there be a more viral medium than YouTube? So it is, that YouTube and contests come together to give participating viewers a chance to walk away with some cool prizes.
How do you find the YouTube contests to play in and which ones are the coolest? The first is rather easy; the second is your pick. But here’s the first step.
Search For YouTube Contests
To participate in any contest, you have to log in with your username. Although you can land on a channel’s page and search for a contest announcement, the direct way would be to go to the page which lists most of the contests on YouTube. The Contests holding page lists some of the running ones and also the ones you have missed. Though, they don’t seem to list all contests that are on YouTube.
For instance, YouTube is showcasing a new contest called MyYouTube. I went into it from YouTube’s homepage where it was mentioned under What’s New. On this particular contest, you have to sign up and subscribe to the channels of your favorite celebrities. Those who score high will receive autographed merchandise like CDs, T-Shirts, photographs, and so on from the celebrity.
This contest though seems to be open for a few selected countries like India and is a clever push to promote
celebrity channels through viral social networking.
The other way to sweep YouTube for ongoing contests seems to be from the search bar. Type in a keyword like “contests 2011” and then use the Search Options to filter through the results.
Which Are The Cool Ones?
Here’s a sampling of five YouTube contests I found to be quite cool.
The Innocent Mini Movies Competition
The hero is a super smoothie bottle. You have to make a follow-up to this TV ad and hope the audience finds it funny enough to vote you to the top prize. That’s £5,000 ($8,000) and lots of other windfalls. Contest closes 17th April.
Steal The Spotlight
Submit a music video that’s less than 6 minutes showcasing a solo or a group performance. MTV will judge the videos and select the winner. Winner gets an all expenses paid trip to open a VMA weekend event plus other goodies. Submissions start from April 4th.
Hyundai and YouTube partner together on this skill based contest. Create an original music video that represents the soul and spirit of “Mothership Remix”, composed by modern-day classical music artist Mason Bates, composer-in-residence of YouTube Symphony Orchestra. The contest started on March 14th and will end on June 7th.
Ecomagination Line Dance Contest
This contest started in February and will close on April 8th. By the time you read this, you will have just a few days left to send in your ‘line dance’ video. The combined goal is to help GE do its bit for clean drinking water in developing countries. You stand to gain $10,000 worth of eco-friendly appliances.
Create or Else
Ogilvy’s channel is not about a contest actually…it is about inspiring ideas. The channel asks for video submissions from the creative types in the world who have found solutions that can somehow benefit the larger world. As the site says, your rewards are – worldwide glory, a feeling of supreme personal satisfaction and maybe even a dose of inspiration for yourself.
In the short time, I couldn’t of course participate in all of them and see how they ultimately pan out. I am hoping that you find YouTube contests fun enough to let us know which are the ones you liked.
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