Every Monday in February, we’re profiling the category winners of the 2015 Flying Solo Awards. Today, we’re featuring our Innovator Award winner, Amanda Westphal from Prize Pig.

Running competitions has long been harnessed by major brands as a marketing strategy, but it’s one that’s been largely inaccessible for small businesses without a PR agency. (Ordinarily, if a small business calls a magazine, they will be diverted straight to a sales team.)

Amanda Westphal from Prize Pig saw an opportunity to re-design the entire system, disrupting PR and media companies across Australia since launching last year.

She says:

“The concept of Prize Pig is simple. The process of pitching products as prizes to media outlets is a PR strategy used by thousands of PR professionals in Australia. It was my idea to automate this process, and therefore make it cost effective for small businesses to access.

This simple idea resulted in the online platform connecting 100 small businesses with media outlets daily.”

The custom platform took 12 months to develop and create, and functions like a dating website, connecting small businesses with major media using competitions. The process is simple: a small business can view over 150 different competitions that a huge range of media outlets have coming up, and offer their prizes for this competition.

This arrangement gives the SMB a partnership with a major media outlet without the media spend. The media outlet benefits because they’re able to secure prizes for their competitions quickly and easily.

The results? Since launching Prize Pig has secured over $5,000,000 in media exposure for over 100 small businesses in Australia – partnering them with stations like Channel 10, major breakfast radio programs and magazines like GQ and Women’s Weekly.

What do people have to say about it?

From the media outlets:

Prize Pig has been a TRUE game changer for STUDIO10. With the format of our morning show including daily giveaways, Amanda and her team have taken so much of the stress away. It’s a win win scenario. STUDIO10 gets great gifts to giveaway and Amanda gets her clients priceless exposure. From sourcing novel products and vouchers to getting them to us on time and without a fuss, we are huge fans of PRIZE PIG!!

~ Raelene Metlitzky, Integration Manager Studio 10

From the small businesses:

I’ve been augmenting our marketing with Prize Pig campaigns to create the pop and sizzle that makes us appear to be “everywhere.” For a very good price, we get big company exposure on our modest ad budget. Prize Pig is an amazing and very affordable service! The team is great and they have access to a lot of opportunities. If you need to get in front of the public, Prize Pig is where you go 🙂

~ Sarah Saputra, Founder, Belle Fever

Additionally:

Alex from Build A Shed was in January’s Better Homes & Gardens and his brand was promoted on Channel  10 in early October. Totalling almost $40,000 in media exposure.

Jacaranda Hampers were featured in MindFood, Channel 10, and also a Variety Charity Gala event, totalling over $25,000 in media value in their first month with Prize Pig.

Direct Wine Cellars were promoted on Channel 10, KIIS FM nationally, 2UE and Canberra Weekly over just 8 weeks totalling over $90,000 in media exposure!

At the core of Prize Pig’s innovation is its ability to show a true ROI for those paying for the service as well as the fact that it is a genuine win-win for both parties involved in the transaction.

Does Amanda have any suggestions for how her approach could be applied by fellow soloists, SMBs and lifestyle business owners?

The biggest innovation opportunities for small businesses lie in community creation and user generation. We have the opportunity to connect and collaborate with so many other like-minded business owners across Australia and the world.

Prize Pig has developed a members only Facebook group where businesses can interact, share successes and ask questions. We get wonderful feedback from our community and they love this element to the membership. It allows hundreds of business owners in their home offices to connect with people at a similar stage.

Online innovation is moving towards a focus on authenticity, engagement and community.

The content is Prize Pig is also user generated, much like AirBNB and similar platforms. Media add in the competitions themselves, and small businesses list their prizes. This allows Prize Pig to be completely scalable, ensuring that we can support thousands of Australian business owners to grow their brands quickly and cost effectively. Being user generated is a huge opportunity for those looking to innovate, as it allows for a scalable platform with content that the clients are interested in.

So there you go! We hope Amanda thoughts and achievements have sparked something for you. The key to making any business a lifestyle  business lies in the ability to step away from the day-to-day minutiae of it and Amanda has achieved that along with an enviable level of scalability.

If you’ve got any questions or congratulations for Amanda – please feel free to share them below!