How to Reward Customers for Posting and Tagging on Social Media
Collecting content into your own library is one thing.
Getting customers to post about you on their own social media - reaching their audience, on their feed - is another level entirely.
Here's how to set it up so you only reward posts you've verified.
Rewards guide
6 min read · Updated July 2026
In this guide
Collecting customer photos and videos into your 82DASH library is one thing. Getting those same customers to also post about you on their own Instagram, TikTok, or Facebook is another level entirely.
When a customer posts on their own feed, their audience sees it. Their friends see it. It’s a personal recommendation from someone they trust, on a platform where they’re already scrolling. That kind of organic reach is almost impossible to buy.
With 82DASH, you can do both in the same flow. Collect the content into your library (photos, videos, or both) and ask the customer to post it on their social media and tag you. You get the content for your marketing. They generate organic reach on their feed. Everyone wins.
The challenge is: how do you verify the social post actually went up before you hand over a reward?
That’s where 82DASH’s Reward by Selection comes in.
The problem with “post and tag us”
Most brands that try this approach do it informally. A sign in the shop: “Tag us on Instagram for a chance to win!” A line in the email: “Post your order and tag @ourbrand!” A note on the packaging: “Share your unboxing on social and we’ll repost!”
The problems are obvious:
You have no way to track it. Checking your tagged posts manually is time-consuming and unreliable. Instagram’s algorithm doesn’t show you every post you’re tagged in. TikTok mentions are even harder to find. People misspell your handle. Stories disappear after 24 hours.
You can’t verify before rewarding. If you promise “post and get 10% off” as an instant reward, people will claim the discount without posting. Or they’ll post, get the reward, then delete the post five minutes later. You’ve paid for reach you never got.
There’s no system. It’s all informal, manual, and impossible to scale. You can’t run a serious social media content programme on “check our tagged posts when we remember.”
82DASH solves all three problems.
How it works: the Reward by Selection flow
Here’s the setup, step by step.
Step 1: Create your content request
In 82DASH, create a new content request. Choose photo, video, or both - this is the content that lands in your library for you to use on product pages, ads, email, and anywhere else.
Then use the content brief to explain the social media element. Your brief should be clear and specific:
What to create (a photo of your product, a video of their experience, an unboxing, a styling reel, a testimonial clip - whatever fits your brand)
That you want them to post it on their own social media (Instagram feed, Instagram Stories, TikTok, Facebook - be specific)
How to tag you (your exact handle, any hashtags you want them to use)
That they should also upload the content through 82DASH and include their social media handle
For example: “Film a quick video showing how you use [product]. Post it on Instagram or TikTok, tag @yourbrand and use #YourHashtag. Then upload the video here and drop your handle so we can find your post and send your reward.”
This way you collect the content into your 82DASH library (rights-cleared, ready to use) and get the organic social reach from their post. Two assets from one ask.
Step 2: Choose Reward by Selection
This is the crucial bit. Choose Reward by Selection as your reward type.
With Reward by Selection, the customer doesn’t get the reward automatically when they submit. Instead, they receive a contact card - your brand saved to their Apple or Google Wallet - and their submission goes into your review queue.
You then check that the post actually went up. Did they tag you? Did they use the hashtag? Is the content genuine? Is the post still live?
Once you’ve verified, you select their submission in 82DASH and the reward is delivered to them via their wallet pass.
This verification step is what makes the whole thing work. You only reward real posts that are actually live on social media. No gaming the system. No paying for posts that got deleted.
Step 3: Set your reward
Because you’re asking for something more valuable than a standard content submission - they’re posting on their own feed, reaching their own audience, putting their reputation behind your brand - the reward should reflect that.
For social media posts, consider:
Higher-value discount codes. 20-25% off rather than the 10% you might offer for a simple photo upload.
Free products. Send them a free item from your next collection. This also seeds future content.
Third-party vouchers. A $10 or $20 Amazon or DoorDash voucher. You can upload these as a CSV in 82DASH (see our article on third-party vouchers).
Exclusive access. Early access to a sale, a new product launch, or a limited edition item.
The reward needs to feel worth the effort of creating and posting public content. A 5% discount won’t cut it. Make it meaningful.
Step 4: Distribute and communicate
Share your content request via your usual channels - QR codes, email, SMS, wallet pass push notifications, your website.
The brief is everything here. Customers need to understand the flow clearly:
Post on your social media and tag us
Submit your handle through this link
We’ll check your post
If verified, your reward is delivered to your phone
Be upfront that it’s Reward by Selection - they’re submitting for verification, not getting an instant reward. Frame it positively: “We’ll check your post and send your reward within 48 hours” is better than “rewards are not guaranteed.”
Why this is better than influencer marketing
Let’s put some numbers on this.
A micro-influencer with 10,000 followers might charge $200-500 per post. For that, you get one post, from one person, reaching one audience, once.
Now imagine 50 of your real customers each posting to their own networks - friends, family, colleagues who actually know and trust them. The combined reach might be similar to that influencer, but the trust factor is completely different. A recommendation from a friend outperforms a sponsored post every time.
And the cost? If you’re offering a 20% discount code as the reward (which costs you far less than 20% of the customer’s next order if they use it), 50 verified posts might cost you a fraction of a single influencer fee.
You’re not replacing influencer marketing. You’re building a layer underneath it that’s cheaper, more authentic, and more scalable.
Use cases that work particularly well
Product launches
“Be one of the first to share our new [product] on Instagram or TikTok. Post a photo or video, tag us, and upload it here for [reward].” This creates a wave of organic content around your launch - and you get the original files in your library for ads and product pages.
Restaurants and cafes
“Film a quick video of your meal or snap a photo. Post it on Instagram and tag @yourrestaurant, then upload it here for a free dessert on your next visit.” Food content is the most natural social media content there is. Video of a sizzling dish or a cocktail being poured performs incredibly on Reels and TikTok - and you get the clip for your own channels too.
Events
“Capture your favourite moment at [event] - photo or video. Post it on Instagram or TikTok, tag @yourbrand, and upload it here for a chance to win [prize].” Events generate huge amounts of social content. Reward by Selection lets you pick the best posts and reward those creators, while building a library of event footage you own.
Fashion and beauty
“Style our [product] your way - photo or try-on video. Post it, tag us, and upload it here. We’ll reward our favourite looks each week.” This works as an ongoing campaign, not just a one-off. Each week you select the best styling posts and reward them. The videos and photos land in your library for future ad creative.
Hospitality
“Share your stay with us - a room tour video, a sunset photo, whatever catches your eye. Post it on Instagram, tag @yourhotel, and upload it here for [reward].” Guest content of hotel rooms, views, pools, and restaurants performs brilliantly on social media. A video from a real guest is worth more than any travel blogger collaboration - and you have the original in your content library.
The contact card advantage
Here’s something most people don’t think about: even customers who submit their handle but don’t get selected for the reward still receive a contact card when they submit.
That means every participant in your social media campaign now has your brand saved in their Apple or Google Wallet. You have a push notification channel to all of them - not just the winners.
Next time you run a similar campaign, you don’t need to hope they open an email. You send a push notification: “New campaign - post your latest look and tag us for a chance to win [reward].” It hits their lock screen with a 90%+ open rate.
Over time, you build an audience of socially active customers who are primed to post about your brand. Each campaign grows the wallet pass base, which makes the next campaign easier to launch and more effective.
Tips for better results
Be specific about what to create. “Post about us” is vague. “Film a 15-second video showing how you style our jacket” or “Post a photo of you wearing it in natural light and tag @brand” gives them creative direction. Specific asks get better content - and better content on their feed means better content in your library.
Set a deadline. “Post by Sunday and we’ll select winners on Monday” creates urgency and makes the review process manageable. Open-ended campaigns tend to fizzle.
Show examples. Include one or two example posts in your content brief. “Here’s the kind of thing we’re looking for.” This raises the quality of submissions significantly.
Review promptly. Don’t leave people waiting a week to find out if they’ve been selected. Check posts within 48 hours and send the reward. The faster you close the loop, the more likely they are to participate again.
Celebrate the winners. Repost the selected content on your own feed (you’ve got the rights because they submitted through 82DASH). Tag the customer. This shows future participants what winning looks like and motivates more people to enter.
Consider running it as a regular programme. Monthly or weekly social media challenges keep the momentum going. “This month’s challenge: show us your morning routine with [product].” Regular cadence builds habit.
Running social campaigns alongside always-on collection
You can run a social media posting campaign alongside your standard always-on content collection. They serve different purposes and work well in parallel.
Your always-on Instant Reward campaign collects photos and videos with no social posting requirement - quick, frictionless, great for volume. Every submission gets rewarded automatically.
Your Reward by Selection social media campaign asks for more - create the content, post it publicly, tag you, and upload it. Higher effort, but you get both the content in your library and organic social reach. The best submissions get rewarded.
One is your steady content engine. The other is your social amplification tool. Both generate wallet pass holders. Both build your push notification audience.
Reward customers for posting - start today.
Start collecting content →