A contest is a game of skill. Unlike sweepstakes, a contest may not have any elements of chance associated with it and may have consideration of some sort associated with it.

With few exceptions, there is no bonding or registration requirement for contests, but if contests are not administered appropriately, they can draw the attention of the state attorney general nonetheless. More importantly, if a contest is not constructed carefully, it will not provide companies with the positive marketing results they were hoping for.

Cobalt works with clients and their marketing departments to make certain that the contest is structured in such a way that it is not only done in compliance with the law, but done with a focus on getting the desired results. We work to flesh out both the concept behind the promotion as well as the administration of the promotion to make certain that the contest is effective and actually do-able.

One common pitfall that often sneaks up on companies is the time and effort involved in creating the judging criteria. All contests rules must identify how each entry is going to be scored. If the judging criteria is too lenient, then a company may get too many entries and be forced to judge many more submissions than it anticipated. This can add tremendously to the cost of administering the contest, particularly if the contest is an essay or other type of written contest. Moreover, the potential for a tie is increased, which means more judging. Cobalt helps companies fully analyze their rules and judging criteria to make certain it will yield the best results.

Some contests, particularly those that require technical submissions, require the judges themselves to have technical expertise. In cases where the judging must be done by people outside the company, Cobalt helps to set a budget and make realistic targets about how long entries will take to be judged.

Contests that involve submissions of new products or inventions are particularly difficult to administer, because such external submissions can muddy the existing research conducted in a company. Cobalt helps focus organizations on how to create such contests so that intellectual property disputes are less likely to happen in the long run.