What are Giveaways?

Stays allows Hosts to craft and coordinate Giveaways right within our platform

A Giveaway is a social media contest where you offer a free stay at your property in exchange for engagement—follows, likes, comments, tags, and shares. It's one of the fastest ways to grow your audience, build brand awareness, and convert casual scrollers into future guests and repeat visitors.

Stays makes running one simple. Inside your Stay Dashboard, the 'Giveaway Builder' tool walks you through setting up a campaign from start to finish; entry rules, prize details, date restrictions, media assets, etc. As you set up your Giveaway, you can choose to have it promoted across our portfolio of partnered Instagram outlets, putting your property in front of travelers who already follow accounts in your market. For full Giveaway Terms, see HERE

Giveaways are published by Stays and then can be amplified across our network

Giveaways FAQs: What to Know

Overview

• Q: How are Giveaways different from regular Promotions?
• • A: Giveaways are a specialized type of Promotion built specifically for contest-style campaigns. Unlike standard Promotions, Giveaways follow a fixed format, run on a set timeline, and are managed end-to-end by the Stays team. This creates consistency, fairness, and a more structured process for you as the Host, as well as for participants.

• Q: Are Giveaways basically just Instagram contests I could run myself?
• • A: Technically, yes. But a Giveaway through Stays is a different beast. It's a fully managed, structured campaign that taps into established audiences of new travelers and vacation rental enthusiasts. Hosts get the reach of new users, professional execution, and built-in participation rules without having to handle the legal, logistical, or moderation side themselves. A self-run giveaway might net you a handful of new followers from people you already know. A Stays-run Giveaway puts your property in front of a self-selected audience actively looking for their next stay.

• Q: What's the value in running a Giveaway?
• • A: Giveaways are one of the highest-engagement campaign types we offer. Beyond exposure for the Stay itself, a well-run Giveaway typically drives significant follower growth for the Host's brand account, generates hundreds (sometimes thousands) of comments and saves, and puts the property in front of a self-selected audience of travelers who are actively interested in vacation rentals. For Hosts focused on long-term brand building and direct bookings, not just one-off OTA reservations, Giveaways are one of the fastest ways to build an engaged, location-relevant following and reduce dependency on Airbnb, VRBO, and other booking platforms.

• Q: Who manages the Giveaway?
• • A: The Stays team handles everything once you submit your preferences and details using the Giveaway Builder: post publishing, validating participation eligibility, winner selection, etc. This isn't optional—managing Giveaways end-to-end is how we keep them consistent, fair, and compliant with platform rules. Once completed, we'll get in contact with the Host to ensure a smooth handoff so they can set up the free stay prize with the winner.

Setting Up Your Giveaway

• Q: Where will my Giveaway be posted on social media?
• • A: All Giveaway Campaigns are published on the @americanstays Instagram outlet. Unlike standard Promotions, Hosts do not choose from a broad range of 'Posting Outlets' for Giveaways—@americanstays is used exclusively. This keeps the format consistent across campaigns, centralizes the audience for maximum participation, and keeps the compliance side clean. However, you'll have the option to add your own Instagram account and/or other Instagram outlets as a collaboration and/or amplification partner to further expand its reach. Regardless of where it's published and how it's amplified, following your stay's own brand account will be the key participation requirement.

• Q: What will my Giveaway post look like?
• • A: To keep Giveaways consistent and recognizable across our network, all campaigns follow the same standardized design templates. There is less creative flexibility here than with other Promotion types, but Hosts still have a few key decisions to make in the Giveaway Builder:
    
    - The Giveaway Variation selected: Hosts choose between a Multi-Image Carousel (a static feed post with multiple images of the Stay) or a Reel (a short-form video optimized for reach and discovery).
    
    - The Media selected to infuse: Hosts can suggest the exact photos and video clips to use. If they're unsure what will perform best, they can offload the decision and allow the Stays Admin Team to select on their behalf.
    
    Unlike Promotions, the Posting Outlet is fixed (@americanstays), the captions follow a templated structure, and the participation requirements are standardized across every Giveaway campaign.

• Q: How much do Giveaways cost?
• • A: The cost of each Giveaway is variable depending on the specific factors that go into it, such as the Giveaway's optional Amplification and/or Boosting add-ons. As a Host makes their way through the Giveaway Builder, they will see a cost tracker that clearly outlines the pricing of each specific variable included in the Giveaway that's created.

• Q: Once purchased, how are Giveaways scheduled and ultimately published?
• • A: Once a Giveaway has been submitted and paid for, it enters the Stays Admin internal Giveaway queue. While we aim to publish in a timely manner, we cannot guarantee specific publish dates or times. Exact publication timeline depends on a variety of factors such as the current Giveaway queue, macro promotional demand, and administrative resourcing. On average, most Giveaways are published within 1-2 weeks of payment, and Hosts are notified once theirs goes live.

• Q: How long will Giveaways run for?
• • A: Every Giveaway runs for 14 days from its publish date. This gives the campaign time to circulate and maximizes the number of eligible entries.

The Prize & Host Requirements

• Q: What do Hosts need to offer as the prize?
• • A: At minimum, one free night at your property; however, we suggest a 2-night stay to make travel more feasible. The winner cannot be charged for cleaning, taxes, or any other required fees. You may offer optional add-ons (such as a pet fee), and you may require the winner to book through a platform of your choice with payment info for a refundable security deposit.

• Q: Can I require the winner to book on Airbnb, VRBO, or another platform?
• • A: Yes. You can require the winner to make their reservation on a booking platform so you can collect a refundable security deposit and use that platform's standard protections.

Participation & Winner Selection

• Q: How do participants earn entries? Who is eligible to win?
• • A: Participants earn entries by completing participation actions such as liking the Giveaway post, following both your brand account and @americanstays (or the designated collaboration partner), and commenting on the post. For most Giveaways, we will allow each comment to counts as one eligible entry (max 100). Participants must be 18 or older and be able to provide a valid form of ID in order to be eligible to win if selected. Additionally, we may allow for additional forms of entry through other social media accounts and/or a user's Stays account. Having multiple channels of entry allow for more participation and more reach of the Giveaway content and the property at the center of it all.

• Q: How is the winner selected? What happens if the selected winner doesn't respond?
• • A: We aggregate all entries and to randomly select a tentative winner. Our team then verifies the tentatively selected winner met all participation requirements (i.e. liked the post, followed the required accounts). Only after verification that this tentatively selected winner met the participation requirements do we make contact. The tentatively selected winner has 24 hours to respond to our notification that they won. If they don't respond in time, their selection becomes void and we select a new tentative winner. The process repeats until a finalized winner is selected, verified, and confirmed.

• Q: Can I reach out to participants or get involved in selecting the winner?
• • A: No. Hosts must not contact participants or get involved in the winner selection process at any stage. This protects the integrity of the giveaway and keeps everyone compliant with Instagram's promotion rules.

• Q: When do I get the winner's information?
• • A: Once the winner is confirmed and in contact with our Stays Team, Stays will share the winner's name and contact information with you so you can coordinate the stay directly.

For more information on the official Giveaway rules, you can review the Giveaway Terms that will be references with every Giveaway.

Ready to build your audience and brand?

This guide walks you through every step of crafting and launching a successful Giveaway with the Giveaway Builder tool within Stays. Continue on in this guide for more information on each step:

Step 1. Creating a New Giveaway

Step 2. Selecting the Variation

Step 3. Acknowledging the Overview

Step 3. Confirming the Posting Outlet

Step 4. Selecting Amplification options

Step 5. Selecting the Media

Step 6. Selecting the Boost options

Step 7. Crafting the Details and Messaging

Step 8. Review, Submission, and Payment

Step 9. Awaiting Publishing

Step 10. Honoring the Prize