How to Setup a Selfie Contest for Your Program

How to Set Up a Selfie Contest for Your Program

The CoffeePals Selfie Contest is a fun engagement feature that encourages participants to snap and share selfies during their coffee chats. The photo posted to the channel with the most emoji reactions wins! It's a great way to boost participation, build team culture, and add a little friendly competition to your matching program.

What Is the Selfie Contest?

The Selfie Contest is an activity tied to your CoffeePals matching program's match cycle. After participants confirm they've met with their coffee match by answering "Yes" to the "Did you meet?" prompt, they're invited to upload a selfie together. The selfie is posted to a designated channel where team members vote by adding emoji reactions. At the end of the reporting period, the selfie with the most reactions wins and is announced automatically.

You can run the Selfie Contest alongside any matching program — whether it's Random Matching, Lottery, Intra-Group, Cross-Group, or Cross-Audience.

How to Set Up a Selfie Contest

Step 1: Enable the Selfie Contest

In your program settings, toggle the Selfie Contest feature on. This is a per-program setting — each matching program can have its own selfie contest configuration.

Note: The Selfie Contest is a paid feature. You'll need an active subscription to enable it.

Step 2: Choose Channels

Select one or more channels where selfie contest results will be posted. You configure channels per audience, so different audiences in your program can have different announcement channels.

Each channel configuration includes:

Audience — which group of participants will see it
Channel — the Slack or Teams channel where winners are announced

Tip: A dedicated channel keeps selfies easy to find and vote on without getting lost in other messages.

Step 3: Let It Run

Once enabled, the selfie contest runs automatically with your match cycles. No manual triggering is needed — CoffeePals handles the prompts, uploads, voting, and winner announcements on its own schedule.

How It Works — Participant Experience

1. Confirm Your Meeting

After you meet with your coffee match, answer "Yes" to the "Did you meet?" prompt. This triggers the selfie upload invitation for both you and your match.

2. Upload Your Selfie

Both participants receive an upload prompt:

On Slack: A modal opens with a file picker and an optional caption field
On Teams: An Adaptive Card appears — reply to the prompt with your image

You can add an optional caption (up to 120 characters) to go along with your selfie.

3. Preview and Confirm

After selecting your image, you'll see a preview with your caption. You can either confirm or discard and try again. Once confirmed:

Your selfie is posted to the designated channel
Both you and your match receive a confirmation message

Note: Only one selfie is submitted per match — whichever participant uploads first sets the photo for the pair.

4. Vote With Reactions

During the reporting period, team members vote by adding emoji reactions to their favorite selfies in the channel. All emoji reactions count equally — whether it's a thumbs up, heart, or coffee cup, each reaction is one vote.

Important: Reactions added after the reporting period ends are not counted.

5. Winners Announced Automatically

About one hour before the reporting period ends, CoffeePals automatically:

Counts reactions on all submitted selfies
Determines the winner(s) — the selfie(s) with the most reactions
Posts a winner announcement card to all configured channels

If there's a tie, all selfies with the top reaction count win — multiple winners are celebrated together.

Admin Management

Viewing Entries

Navigate to your program's Selfie Contest tab to see all entries organized by match cycle. You can view submitted selfies, captions, and reaction counts.

Deleting Entries

Admins can delete selfie entries, which removes the image from storage and cleans up any posted messages in Slack or Teams.

Disabling the Contest

Toggling the selfie contest off will cancel any pending winner announcement jobs for the current cycle.

Best Practices for a Successful Selfie Contest

Find enthusiastic champions — Recruit a few excited team members to kick off the first contest and set the tone.
Celebrate winners publicly — Showcase winning selfies during monthly team meetings or in a "Hall of Fame" channel.
Encourage creativity — Suggest fun themes like "best coffee mug," "most creative background," or "best virtual selfie."
Send reminders — A mid-cycle reminder can help boost submissions before the reporting period closes.
Keep it inclusive — Virtual selfies (screenshots from video calls) count too, so remote team members can participate.
Add a prize — Offering a small prize like a coffee gift card, a shoutout in the next team meeting, or a fun trophy can significantly boost participation.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I run a Selfie Contest with any matching program?

Yes! The Selfie Contest works with any CoffeePals matching program, including Random Matching, Lottery, Intra-Group, Cross-Group, and Cross-Audience.

How often does the contest run?

The contest runs automatically with each match cycle. Winners are determined and announced near the end of each reporting period.

What if there's a tie?

All selfies with the highest reaction count are declared winners. Multiple winners are celebrated together in the announcement.

Do virtual selfies count?

Absolutely! Participants can take a screenshot during their video call. The goal is to capture the moment and have fun — no in-person meeting required.

Can participants vote on their own selfie?

Reactions are tracked from the platform (Slack or Teams) — any reaction from any user counts. Set ground rules in your announcement if you'd like to limit self-voting.

When do reactions stop counting?

Reactions are no longer counted after the reporting period ends. The winner is determined based on reactions received during the active reporting period.

Do I need a paid plan to run a Selfie Contest?

Yes, the Selfie Contest is a paid feature that requires an active subscription on your program.

How is the selfie image handled?

Uploaded images are resized and stored securely in cloud storage. On Slack, the image is also uploaded natively for better rendering. On Teams, images are embedded in Adaptive Cards.

Updated on: 31/03/2026

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