South Africa’s first dedicated online photo uploading competition site, Teedu, has announced that it will be introducing exciting changes to its platform this month.

The site is based on a system of challenges known as “missions” used to connect customers with brands. For each challenge completed, users are given a certain amount of points, which enters them into a draw for a prize. The more point’s users accumulate, the better their chance of winning.

The first change will be a photograph filter, similar to Instagram, allowing users to make modifications to their photographs. The modification will automatically add the logo of the company involved in the challenge to the uploaded photograph.

“Many companies allow users to post pictures to their Facebook profile, or they have companies setting up photo booths at their events,” says Tyrone Middleton, director of Teedu.co.za. “But a new study by Harvard Business School shows that only 12% of photographs directly promote the business involved. We wanted to change that.”

Middleton believes that seeing users engaging with the product and seeing the logo on the image has a similar (if not more effective) effect as advertising. “Seeing your friends having a ball at a camp site is great…but when you look at the image and realise that they are camping out at Rocking the Daisies, you immediately form a positive connection with that brand.”

Teedu currently has several challenges for the holiday season, including a tongue-in-cheek challenge that encourages people to upload all “the things to do before 21 December”, the day the world will supposedly end. There is also a Christmas tree challenge whereby users can upload photos of their favourite shopping mall Christmas tree.

Users can enter many competitions from a single platform, free of charge, obligation free. “You aren’t spammed with dozens of notifications,” Middleton promised. “It’s as easy as uploading your pic and winning.”

For more about Teedu, click here.