What are the best viral marketing tools for competitions?

Having run a few viral competitions and viral marketing campaigns myself for some of the largest brands in Australia, and some global startups, I can rest assure you that building a custom viral competition from scratch isn't a fun process. There are a lot of moving parts and mechanics to take into account. Thankfully, there are good number of viral competition tools available, and these are my top 5 favourites: Viral Loops, Vyper, Gleam, Upviral, and Viral Sweep.

Can these viral competition tools work for waiting lists and referrals?

Yep, they certainly can. Viral Loops and Viral Sweep are the two best tools for waiting lists and encouraging referrals. Each have lots of epic features. One thing that is great about Viral Loops is that they have templates which you can use to 'plug-and-play', including templates with mechanics used that have helped initial growth with Dropbox and newsletter growth with Morning Brew.

Can you integrate these viral marketing tools as part of your SaaS to increase virality and referrals?

The simple answer with some of these tools mentioned in this article is yes. However, will require some development work to achieve a custom solution that you may be wanting. Otherwise, a few of them already have embed options which make this easy.

10 Best Viral Marketing Tools for Competitions & Campaigns (2024)

Favourite

Gleam

About:

Another favourite viral marketing tool of mine to build viral competitions and campaigns is Gleam.

Top Features:

The team behind this platform have done a great job making it so simple to setup a viral campaign in just minutes. The features are awesome and there are plenty of integrations available.

There are lots of ways you can run viral comps, and this tool has thought of it all. Choose the mechanics of how the competition should run, add instant rewards, it has built-in sharing to increase virality and track all entries from initial entry to referred entries.

Simply embed the widgets on your site and landing page, and drive your audience. The widget is responsive for mobile audiences. There's also fraud protection and language support available.

Widgets

rewards based campaigns

social following

Pricing:

Outside of competitions, there are other products as part of Gleam. You can get access to all apps for just $97 per month. Awesome value.

Web/App

Paid

$-$$

Learn more

Favourite

Vyper

About:

Looking to build viral contests and competitions which generate lots of emails and shares? You need to check out Vyper.

Top Features:

I love this platform and it's so easy to use, no matter your skill level. This software let's you build landing pages, has dashboard to track entries and referrals, ability to embed on your domain and loads more.

This tool has the features you expect from any referral marketing software, with all the smart referral tracking and logic, which is built into this platform. If you've ever built viral comps manually, you know it's really hard to do (I've done it before, it's not easy). Choose from their existing templates, and add your own branding.

The editor is simple. Add your content, add media, your prizes/giveaways, setup the entry rules plus more.

Referrals

Viral comps

Landing Pages

Pricing:

Pricing begins at $149 per month. You can save if you purchase the annual plan.

Web/App

Paid

$-$$$

Learn more

Favourite

Viral Loops

About:

When it comes to building a viral marketing campaign, combined with referral marketing mechanics and systems, look no further than Viral Loops.

Top Features:

Whether you want to create viral comps, pre-launch landing pages for email collection, build a newsletter referral program and more, this platform can help you achieve your goals.

They have some awesome templates which are 'plug and play', that you can choose from to spur your creation.

Designing landing pages and widgets is really fun. Looks awesome when you've finished building. It also has great analytics features to measure your campaign performance.

Newsletters

Templates

waitlist campaign platform

Pricing:

Monthly pricing begins at $49 per month for up to 1000 participants, or $34 per month if billed annually. You'll need to upgrade to the higher-tiered plans for more features and increased participants.

Web/App

Paid

$-$$$$

Learn more

Favourite

Campaignware

About:

When it comes to building engaging content experiences to drive lower cost leads and encourage virality is Campaignware. You need to check out this tool which I've used for some projects and clients.

Top Features:

The use cases of creating viral campaigns for lead generation is really solid. Just visit the gallery to see what's possible.

You can easily embed any of your campaigns on your own CMS or website builder. They've done a good job with mobile responsiveness as well which was something I wanted to ensure looked good for driving traffic.

There are some good automation components too, including the likes of email automation. Additionally, they have a Zapier integration which opens up more possibilities around workflows and integrations with your favourite tools.

Templates

UGC

agencies

Pricing:

Considering the amount of features and content templates available, pricing is pretty good. It's free to sign up and try out the tool, and then plans start from $42 per month.

Web/App

Paid

$-$$

Learn more

Favourite

Woorise

About:

Woorise is a viral marketing campaign platform for those wanting to drive leads, contests and competitions, with added viral flavour.

Top Features:

This tool is very much "All-in-one". You can create conversion-optimised landing pages, quizzes, giveaways and lots more.

They have some good templates that you can choose from to speed up the process of competition creation.

All the referral mechanics are built in, so you don't need to worry about a thing. There's also the option of collecting payments.

Generate leads

Embedded forms

social engagement

Pricing:

For up to 500 entries, you can create contests and campaigns on Woorise for free. For more features and entries, plans start at $23 per month, per site.

Web/App

Paid

$-$$$

Learn more

Favourite

Upviral

About:

Upviral has been around for a few years and is a popular tool used by many marketers and businesses to drive their viral marketing strategies, and run sweepstakes contests. In fact, over 25k+ businesses are using it or have used it.

Top Features:

This is a platform very focused on creating viral and referral campaign experiences, with all the logic built into the platform.

The internal creation process is really easy. You can build viral campaigns in just minutes, whether for competitions or waiting lists.

Included as part of the features are leaderboards, marketing automation such as emails and SMS, retargeting, social sharing and more.

sweepstakes platform

leaderboard contests

reward system

Pricing:

You can get access to the full platform for just $1 for 14 days, then it begins at $79 per month after the 14 day period.

Web/App

Paid

$-$$$

Learn more

Favourite

Viral Sweep

About:

If you're looking for a tool as part of your viral marketing strategy, make sure to take a look at Viral Sweep.

Top Features:

This is one of the best tools to help with your viral marketing efforts, as it's absolutely stacked with awesome features from sweepstakes, waitlists and more.

The platform is easy to pickup, where you can have something created in a matter of clicks. Be inspired of example layouts they've created to help you get started.

There is a huge list of integrations available, from CRM's to analytics, to ensure campaign success.

hosted page forms

instant win

social following

Pricing:

Monthly pricing starts at $49 per month. There are also higher-tiered plans on offer.

Web/App

Paid

$-$$$

Learn more

Favourite

King Sumo

About:

King Sumo is focused on ensuring you build top-performing viral competitions.

Top Features:

Whilst still in beta as I write this article, powered by the Appsumo family, you can build viral campaigns in a breeze.

Made for Wordpress sites, simply integrate the software into your CMS and you're off and running.

The way competitions are designed follows a lot of conversion-optimised principles that many of the top viral comps follow. In fact on their site, it's been created by MIT engineers who have tested who have studied giveaways and what makes them viral.

Wordpress

Email capture

simple interface

Pricing:

There's currently a lifetime offer for just $49 on the Appsumo store. Note: this may change in the future as I wrote this article in early Feb 2022.

Web/App

Paid

$-$$

Learn more

Favourite

Wishpond

About:

Now this is a platform that can do a lot more than just creating referral marketing and social promotion campaigns. Wishpond has loads of features you will love.

Top Features:

There's a lot of features to help you build great marketing experiences, including funnels, landing pages, pop-ups, forms, automations and a lot more.

To help you get started, pick a template which can help you spur ideas for campaigns you want to do. Plus, it helps you get adapted with what's possible with the platform.

Like a lot of the competiton tools, you can create widgets, landing pages and more design options, as well as setup advanced options to ensure the mechanics of your competitions work.

All-in-one

email marketing

Automation

Pricing:

To find out more about pricing, you will need to book a demo.

Web/App

Demo

$-$$$

Learn more

Favourite

Rafflepress

About:

Another great option for Wordpress users to create viral giveaways is Rafflepress.

Top Features:

Achieve all objectives of great viral giveaways, from collecting emails, referral entries, social sharing and more.

With all the smart logic and mechanics built into the platform, you just need to focus on creating beautiful designs for your landing page and the widget.

Building the giveaway is really simple through the visual drag-and-drop editor. Tracking, retargeting and integrations are all there to help you run successful contests.

Wordpress

Integrations

advanced targeting

Pricing:

Pricing starts at $49 per year. Other plans are available to have the software across more sites, as well as more features.

Web/App

Paid

$-$$$

Learn more

Favourite

Shortstack

About:

A platform full of great features for viral contests is Shortstack.

Top Features:

Landing pages, pop-ups, widgets, marketing automation, social sharing, coupons... you name it. Shortstack has thought of it all.

There are plenty of giveaways you can do, from instant win contests, photo contests, puzzles, quizzes, voting, brand photos - there are many options. You can't do this with many other competition platforms.

Managing and publishing giveaways is simple. Easy to embed onto your landing pages/website, and set smart logic for popups and more.

All-in-one

UGC

Beginner friendly

Pricing:

Pricing for up to 10000 entries starts at $99 per month on the business plan. Upgrade to a higher plan for more entries and views.

Web/App

Paid

$-$$$

Learn more

Favourite

Heyo

About:

Launch social competitions and sweepstakes for scale thanks to Heyo.

Top Features:

The visual DIY builder makes it to build contests lightning fast, regardless of your skill level.

With Heyo, you can run video based contests, Instagram, Twitter sweeps, quizzes, photo contests and more.

Make sure to check out the example section on their website to get inspired.

Social giveaways

Campaign builder

great UX

Pricing:

Pricing begins at $25 per month if billed annually, or it's $45 per month, billed monthly. Larger plans for more views and entries..

Web/App

Paid

$-$$$

Learn more

No results found.

10 Best Viral Marketing Tools for Competitions & Campaigns to Drive Big Acquisition (2024)

Gleam

Top Features:

Vyper

Top Features:

Viral Loops

Top Features:

Campaignware

Top Features:

Woorise

Top Features:

Upviral

Top Features:

Viral Sweep

Top Features:

King Sumo

Top Features:

Wishpond

Top Features:

Rafflepress

Top Features:

Shortstack

Top Features:

Heyo

Top Features:

Platform

Pricing

Plans

⚡ Frequently Asked Questions ⚡

What are the best viral marketing tools for competitions?

Can these viral competition tools work for waiting lists and referrals?

Can you integrate these viral marketing tools as part of your SaaS to increase virality and referrals?