How to make your promotion visible to entrants and make it live
The 4 steps
1. Open Launch Control
Once your Promotion has been fully set up, you will be able to proceed to Launch Control.
By launching your promotion, you are simply making it visible to others. It will not be publicized or promoted in any way until you do so but entries will be accepted and will count towards your Entry Allowance.
2. Check that all edits and configurations have been set
Here's a breakdown of all the elements on the Launch Control page:
a) When your promotion is in Draft mode (e.g. not live yet).
This is simply a code that locks your promotion from the World Wide Web whilst you're still in draft mode. You don't want someone guessing your page and seeing all the details of your upcoming promotion until you're ready to go live, so when previewing your promotion, this code is added to the end of the URL. It changes every 24 hours, or you can force it to update immediately to ensure you have a full 24 hours left (useful when sharing it with others to check your promo).
b) Promotion URL
If you intend to share the promotion URL (rather than embedding in your webpage), you'll no doubt want to make some edits before you put this live.
Depending on which Subscription Plan you have, you'll have different options here:
Premium or Enterprise Plan
You can edit all parts of the URL, including choosing a subdomain from any of our many .promo domains and customizing the final part of the URL lovingly known as the 'slug'
Enterprise Plan customers also have the option to set a totally custom URL (e.g., a subdomain of their own domain or an entirely new domain they purchased for the promotion). Contact the Support Team to learn how to set this up (it does require a little technical know-how).
Standard Plan
- You can update the subdomain used for your promotion from a generic number to something more custom. You do this through the SETTINGS PAGE.
- You can choose to use entry. promo as the default domain for your promotion, rather than the beeliked.promo available on the lower plans.
- You can customize the promotion slug (note that you can't call two promotions exactly the same thing, so if you duplicate one, you'll be forced to think of a new name).
Essentials Plan
- You can update the subdomain used for your promotion from the generic number assigned when you first created your Account to something more custom and on-brand for you. You do this through the SETTINGS PAGE.
- You can customize the promotion slug (note that you can't call two promotions exactly the same thing, so if you duplicate one, you'll be forced to think of a new name).
FreeBee Plan
- You can customize the promotion slug (note that you can't call two promotions exactly the same thing; the name must be unique, but only in your Account).
3. Final checks: did you set everything correctly?
- Did you add the terms and conditions for your promotion?
- Did you set up Google Analytics or other third-party tracking so you know what traffic your promotion receives?
- If your promotion is for lead generation, did you set up the enter form (or even turn it off if not required)?
- Finally, the last message anyone sees after playing is the Result Message. You must set up a Result Message for each of your promotion's winning and losing options.
4. Set as public or private
Before you can go live, you need to decide whether your promotion is public or private. If you're not sure which to pick or why, then take a quick read of this article about the difference between public and private promotions.
Once this is set and you've launched, you can't change your mind, so please make sure you pick the right option.
a) You choose Public - this means there is one URL for your promotion, and anyone with that one URL can enter.
b) You choose Private - this means that entry is strictly by invite only. The only way for people to enter is with an InviteLink (or Invite Code). These InviteLinks/codes are generated through the BeeLiked platform's Share Page (or via our API or via automation with Zapier or Integrately). Each InviteLink is valid for one entry only.
If you do select Private, be sure to check out the advanced options, as you can also select if you want people to be able to get back to view the final Result Message after they have used the InviteLink to play.
5. Start your Promotion
What does this really mean? Well, it means that your page is no longer in Draft mode, so if you share the URL to it, people anywhere can see it (and if public, can enter it). It also means that any test entries you made to your promotion will be removed, and any prizes used with those test entries will all be reset.
You can still edit your promotion when it is live.
- Go Live: Public - is straight forward as you either can start right now or you can schedule it to go live on a future date (be sure to update your time zone so it launches to your schedule).
- Go Live: Private - You have a few more options here and must be on a Premium Plan subscription. You can still schedule the launch for a future date (and if you do this, you can also generate your InviteLinks ahead of your launch date), or you can go live right now.
Be sure to check out the advanced options. You can still adjust these when live, but they're pretty handy to know.
