How do you attract the right people to your hackathon?

This is the 2nd article in my hackathon article series - the first one is here and it is about picking a venue for your hackathon. Just like the last article, this one was also prompted by another question I get asked frequently: How do you attract people to participate in a hackathon? And it got me thinking about what motivates people to join a hackathon:

-It's fun

-It's a way of meeting like-minded people

-It's a perfect setting to work intensively on your idea (that is, if you already have one)

-And lastly, people join hacks to win prizes.

Ultimately, prizes are one of the best ways to attract people to hackathons. Carefully selecting a prize for your hack is detrimental to who will participate and what the outcomes will be - and here lays a huge opportunity for your hack.

Think about it like this: if you offer a laptop or spot in a business incubator, you will attract two different kinds of crowds: one that wants a new computer and one that sees themselves working on their idea after the hack. If the goal of your hack is just to get people to come together, build community and have fun, the first prize will work best in attracting people. It will most likely attract people who are participating in the hack just to pass their time. But if your goal is to implement the ideas or problem solutions the hackathon, then your prize should reflect that.

So, for the hackathons I organize, I pick prizes based on the outcome I want after the hack. Usually the ideal outcome is seeing new startups form or turning the winning ideas into reality. Therefore, the prizes in my hackathons are spots in incubation/acceleration programs, consulting hours, promotion online and access to networks. These type of prizes attract people who are willing to invest their time after the hackathon to continue working on their idea.

Cash prizes are not as effective as one would think.

What I would advise to avoid are pure cash prizes - they make the time spent hacking calculable, which shifts the attention from innovating to working. I recently funded a cash prize for a hackathon I was a partner at and people pointed out that the sum felt relatively small when split up between different team members. Given that the teams worked for several days, it became apparent that the money was not worth it and that they would be better off working on a job rather than participating in the hackathon. What was of interest to the participants was however the opportunity to realize their ideas after the hack. This means that if you want to have a monetary prize - I would advise to pay it out as a grant with the condition that the team uses it to implement the idea. This is usually eassier to get sponsored as it makes more sense out of a business perspective to a potential partner, than for example a pure cash prize for the winners to spend freely.

All in all, some of the biggest hacks I have organized have not included cash prizes at all. They have actually offered mentorship and spots in incubators, and contrary to popular belief, those hacks have attracted the largest numbers of participants. People participate in hackathons to get something unmeasurable out of it, like contacts, mentorship or new experiences, not iPads or cash.