Thursday, March 22, 2012

Winning Ways: The Basics…and a $500 dollar giveaway!



Why are there so many giveaways? These day companies are using bloggers as a type of word-of-mouth advertising to draw attention to their products through reviews and giveaways. Also, some blogs find sponsors who will advertise on their site and occasionally have a giveaway (as with yarn shops). Of course companies do their own sweepstakes on their websites and Facebook, but these often have many, many people entering and last for months before they close. I find blog giveaways the most fun because there are fewer entrants and they close within days or weeks. Also, bloggers get together to give away gift cards or Paypal cash to promote their blogs and get more readers. Whatever the reason, we benefit!

How to find giveaways:
1.Follow my Twitter feed! Ha ha. (no really, that’s almost all I use it for. @chels580)
2. Find a blog you like that also has giveaways for things relevant to your interests and follow and or subscribe to them.
3. Google search. Almost every day I google “yarn giveaway” and, using the tools (or the little wrench glyph on my ipad), limit it to the past 24 hours. Of course, if you are less compulsive than I, you can search less frequently and select 2 days, one week, or a custom time frame. An added bonus of this rather greedy enterprise is that I’ve found some great knitting blogs, podcasts, and Etsy shops that I happily follow!

How to enter giveaways:
            Needless to say, the instructions are always right there for you. But I want to mention Rafflecopter for the uninitiated so that fear of the unknown will not be an issue. Rafflecopter is a widget that changed the face of blog giveaways ad has made entering them so very easy. When it loads on the blog page you can log in with Facebook or your name and email. I like the facebook login option myself. Here’s a tutorial, if you wish. Have no fear, I have entered oodles of giveaways without my computer bursting into flames. Well, there was that one time, but we can’t really say where the virus actually came from and my husband got to work his sexy computer-fixing mojo!

And just for kicks, here is a Rafflecopter giveaway to win $500 dollars! Contest Chest is a site that lists giveaways of all kinds. If you sign up for their email they will send you a list of giveaways once a day. There is one mandatory entry and everything else is optional. Have fun!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

1 comment:

  1. Haha!!!! I am so glad someone else is entering oodles of blog giveaways!!! Being a stay at home mom means less income so anything helps!!!!

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