Every idea campaign follows the same curve. You launch, you get a spike of submissions in the first 48 hours, and then participation falls off. By day five, it feels like nobody is paying attention. By day ten, you are wondering whether to extend the deadline.
Do not extend the deadline. That almost never works, and it teaches your audience that your deadlines are not real.
Instead, use the tactics in this guide to sustain participation through the middle of a campaign without lowering your standards or chasing people who have already disengaged.
Understanding the Engagement Curve
The spike at launch is not a sign of success. It is just the people who were already excited or who happened to see the announcement first. The real test of your campaign is what happens between day 3 and the close.
A healthy campaign sees a second, smaller spike in the final 48 to 72 hours before close. People who meant to submit later finally get around to it. This second spike is normal and good. It means your reminder communications are working.
What you are managing in the middle is not a crisis. It is the natural shape of participation. Your job is to give people who are interested but not yet committed a reason to act now rather than later.
Three Mid-Campaign Tactics That Work
1. Share a strong submission (without identifying who submitted it)
Post a brief update in your campaign channel saying something like: We have received some strong submissions so far. One that really made us think: [describe the idea in your own words, without attribution]. If this sparked a reaction in you, there is still time to build on it or share a different angle.
This does two things. It proves the campaign is real and ideas are being read. And it gives people a concrete thread to react to, which is much easier than starting from scratch.
Only share an idea this way if the submitter is comfortable with it, and describe it in general terms rather than verbatim. The goal is to spark thinking, not to put a spotlight on one person's work.
2. Post a we are hearing a lot about X update
Mid-campaign, post a brief observation about what themes are emerging: We have noticed a lot of submissions so far are focusing on [theme]. That is useful. We are also still hoping to hear more about [area we have not heard enough about yet]. If you have a perspective there, we would especially welcome it.
This guides late participants toward the gaps rather than re-treading the most obvious territory. It improves the diversity of your final submission pool and makes the evaluation phase easier.
3. Personal outreach to key departments that have not participated yet
By day 5 or 6 of a two-week campaign, you should have enough data to see which departments or teams are underrepresented. A quick message from the campaign owner to a team leader often produces better results than a broadcast reminder. People respond to being specifically invited. They do not always respond to general reminders.
What Not to Do
Do not extend the deadline just because participation slowed down. Once you extend a deadline, you have taught your audience that deadlines are flexible. Next campaign, everyone will wait for the extension before submitting. Extensions also delay your evaluation timeline, which delays your outcome communication, which erodes trust.
Do not add prizes mid-campaign. If you did not launch with an incentive, adding one halfway through signals that the campaign is not working. It also attracts submissions from people who want the prize, not from people who have useful ideas. Incentives can work well when designed in from the start. Retrofitted incentives almost never do.
Do not start privately evaluating and acting on ideas before the campaign closes. Even if an idea is clearly excellent, wait. If participants find out that ideas submitted early got an unfair advantage, you lose their trust in the process.
The Day-by-Day Schedule
For a two-week campaign:
Day 1: Launch email sent. Campaign is open.
Day 2: Check participation numbers. Identify any technical issues.
Day 5: Post a mid-campaign update sharing an emerging theme.
Day 7: Personal outreach to underrepresented departments.
Day 10: Reminder email to participants who have not submitted yet.
Day 12: Final social or Teams post: two days left.
Day 14: Campaign closes. Send the received update immediately.
For campaigns shorter than two weeks, compress accordingly. For campaigns longer than three weeks, add additional mid-campaign touchpoints so momentum does not completely die.
A Quick Note on Volume vs. Quality
More submissions is not always better. A campaign that produces 200 half-formed ideas is harder to evaluate and less likely to result in action than one that produces 40 specific, well-reasoned ones.
The best way to maintain quality while sustaining volume is to show people what a good submission looks like. Use your mid-campaign update to describe a strong idea without identifying it. Give people a model to follow, not just an invitation to fill in a form.
