MJ Bakes - giveaway

Social media is like that guy on your hockey team,

He’s loud, in your face and annoying but also a great player.

You can’t tell him to get lost because you need him, he has lots to offer and will help you win.

Earlier in my journey while experimenting with Instagram I kept seeing giveaways.

There were different types of giveaways, the person or group organizing the giveaways primary objective was to gain followers and grow their network.

Once they gained a particular number of followers it put them in a higher user category which opened up more opportunities for them on the platform.

They would attract providers to offer a gift for giveaway in exchange for growing their own network in hopes of landing some business.

To enter the contest you had to follow, tag, like, comment and engage with them and the gift provider.

After monitoring some of these giveaways for a bit I was very surprised to see several hundred and sometimes thousands of entries for the contest.

At the time I was still trying to land my first client and thought this would be a good way to get a gig.

More importantly I wanted a real life working situation, and to take pictures for someone else other than me.

I contacted a particular giveaway organizer and offered a free photo shoot for business with very specific conditions.

The shoot was for a business product only, no portraits, no family, no pets, no event or anything else listed on a very long list of “um…no thank yous” I was not interested in shooting.

Once the contest opened the entries started to flow in, I watched with excitement wondering who the winner would be.

And the winner is…

MJ Bakes is a home operated family baking business, they make cupcakes and other small sweet treats.

I contacted the owner and we met for a production meeting. It went exactly how I wanted it to go.

I asked all the questions I needed to ask in order to deliver the best I could.

They dropped off all the cakes for me and I spent the day and evening shooting the sweet treats.

The only thing missing from this experience sadly was the financial element.

There needs to be a good business reason to work for free, I believe this was.

I’m glad I did it, it was the right time and I discovered a few useful tips I still use today.

And I got a whole lot of cake too…