Cheers... best to you with yours!  Email me, I'd love to chat for a sec.

Kidgas said:

I have been thinking about a giveaway to celebrate my 100th post on Cash Flow Mantra and have found this thread incredibly useful.  Thanks to Dr. Stock and everyone else for letting me learn from your experience.

Thanks to all your wonderful suggestions... here's there results...

1st giveaway = 73 Entries

2nd giveaway = 991 Entries

Also, I targeted specific goals... this really helped. There was far more exposure... and partnering was also beneficial for both Miss T and myself I believe.

Thanks for all your thoughts, feedback, etc.  Watch for another one in the NEW YEAR! 

Merry Christmas All.

Not that I want to cheap out, but I'm curious what the minimum amount for a giveaway is worthwhile. I'm thinking at least $100 in gift cards or cash. I'm wondering if it makes more sense to make a big splash (hundreds of $$ in prices) or do several smaller giveways. Maybe this depends on circumstance, too, but any thoughts?

I'm going to test your theories and help by launching another giveaway next week!  So, here we go... check back in one week!

I signed up but only had 9 visits.

MoneyIsTheRoot said:

First, make it easy for your contestants to enter.  Use Rafflecopter!  They are simple and easy, and quite effective I have found.  Second, find out what it is you want to accomplish....more FB likes, Twitter followers, email subscribers??  Then weight more entries towards which one it is.  Lastly, you need to promote in the right places.  Yakezie is great, but if you want a lot of outside participation, then websites like online-sweepstakes can really bring in a lot of traffic.

Just do a search for "giveaway websites" and you'll discover a bunch of sites that allow for the promotion of these events.

 

The reason I chose to give away cash was the fact that I know it's something that everyone wants, needs, and can use.  It's basically just trying to match your audience.  Sometimes, it's easier to just go simple.

Thanks to Eric, Squirrelers, Justin and others who have posted advice on giveaways. I've been giving some thoughts on hosting one, and promoting it at giveaway sites did not, would not have occurred to me.

I know it is Saturday but I thought we'd see more action on our 1 yr anniversary giveaway ... 

Thanks for the info folks.

(getting a little off topic here...)

I think that's part of the promotion problem some people are having.  Their mindsets are fixed on attracting a certain type, not realizing that others may be interested in the message if they could just deliver it a little differently.  It's good to have a focus on a desired group of people that you are writing for, but if that group is to small, there will never be any successful growth to come from it.  

It's kind of like the girl who is waiting around for prince charming who has to be above 6'2", muscular, blond with green eyes, masters degree, sensitive, blah blah blah.  The likelihood of that exact match existing is very rare.  

The same goes for us with us promoting blogs.  Sometimes the vision can get too narrow, and finding a decent-sized audience for the writing is terribly difficult.

_____

Squirrelers said:

Focus on the giveaway sites to ensure that yours is a success. I had one last year that generated 900+ people responding, including maybe 100+ (if I recall correctly) that followed on Twitter and something a bit less but still decent in terms of new subscribers...maybe 60-70? Probably could have gotten more if I did the entries differently.

 

My biggest traffic to that post was from giveaway sites.  By ignoring those sites, you're leaving success on the table. Online-sweepstakes was the best site. Try this, and I think you'll do much better with your next giveaway. It's not just other PF bloggers and random search visitors that will enter, not even close.

I have used the "leave a comment" method as a mandatory entry.  I thought it was a good idea for increased interaction, but as Suba mentioned, they game the system so they may not continue to stay as active going forward.

These giveaways work to increase FB likes, twitter followers, and email subscribers, which to me can increase blog credibility...leading to more readers to the blog in the future! At least as a theory lol.

 

(Emphasis added by me). That is all I wanted to know :) That is a good strategy. I was just curious how others are "forcing" these subscribers to participate in anything non-giveaway related... 

These giveaways work to increase FB likes, twitter followers, and email subscribers, which to me can increase blog credibility...leading to more readers to the blog in the future! At least as a theory lol.