Giveaway hot-to? | Yakezie Reader Insights | Yakezie Forums

1)Most people obtain their prizes through buying it themselves. But if you don't have the money, you could ask others to sponsor a prize for you. I'm pretty sure Apple wouldn't sponsor a giveaway, but some smaller companies would gladly give away their product to you for free as a sponsorer.

2) Ask people to subscribe to your RSS, and like you on Facebook. I don't really like Twitter that much, because a) not that many people go on it, and b)it's hard to get traffic from twitter.

If you do a sponsored giveaway with a big company and give away one of their products, like a large sum gift card or some big ticket item that's another way to do it.  Typically though to get a company on board with that kind of collaboration you have to work pretty hard to make sure you meet their requirements.  They might want you to put ads up on your blog, refer your readers to their site/services, or tailor certain aspects of your post/giveaway/touts  (what you say, how often you say it, who you share it with, etc.)  to fit their needs and timeline.   Also, many of these sites have 'requirements' for page rank, traffic and follower numbers to do collaborations or sponsored giveaways.

Otherwise- you can buy an item yourself if it's in budget and you think the payoff will be worth the price of the item and you're willing to promote the heck out of it and get it mentioned on other blogs, etc.  

It's a lot to consider, but I've enjoyed my smaller scale giveaways, it increased my subscribers and I was pretty happy with doing giveaways in the past!

I think giving away an iPad would be cool, but it might be a huge cost unless you've established a really strong readership already…that's more of a "big following" to "Huge following" since you'd need a lot of retweets, some blogger posts and some other serious promoters.  I'm not saying you couldn't do it, but I've seen that most of the bloggers that get the most "entries" are ones that have started with smaller giveaways (like your idea to do a $100 giftcard giveaway first, and offer more later is great) to get core following, then grow that with more giveaways since it's easier to pick up traction. 

People will get really excited about a $100 giftcard- heck I've seen people get fanatical over $20 (Money is always good!) so don't feel like you're selling yourself short, $100 is still a big prize!  A big ticket item promotes itself yes, but if you get a solid following and an enthusiastic crowd that knows you treat them well with semi-frequent giveaways- well you'll have better stats to later pitch an iPad giveaway to a bigger company that could get on board.    In my experience if a blogger is giving away one big ticket item and there are already 200+ entries, I know that I don't have a chance and sometimes I don't enter.  If there's 100 entries for a $100 gift card and a promise that I can re-enter the next time, well that's good too!  

Do what your gut tells you to do, and know I'd be excited about either prize, haha!  

Well, maybe if I actually manage to get in to Rafflecopter by then ;-)

I've thought about the choice, too, and wondered what I would do if *I* won an iPad. I couldn't see keeping it, because if I had any use for one (I already have an iPhone and a netbook), I'd already have bought one myself. $500, on the other hand, I'd jump all over like a crazy person.

I really need  to get in on this Rafflecopter stuff! I had never even heard of it!

I asked this elsewhere but I don't recall a response.

Why do people giveaway so many Amazon gift cards instead of cash from Paypal?

Kay Lynn Akers said:

It really doesn't take long at all to get accepted.  Sign up now so you have your account when you're ready for the next giveaway.

I took your advice and just signed up.  I'm doing a giveaway this week so I doubt I'll be able to get accepted by then so I'll just stay with the ol' comment+random number generator for now.  Thanks for the heads up!

My Personal Finance Journey said:

I usually go with Amazon gift cards because I feel like it's more of a "novelty" than just getting cash which can go in the winner's bank account and be spent or saved. If they get an Amazon gift card, there's more likelihood that they can buy something they want. Just my personal preference 

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Sustainable PF said:

I asked this elsewhere but I don't recall a response.

Why do people giveaway so many Amazon gift cards instead of cash from Paypal?

This works well for American readers.  Amazon.com won't let me buy all sorts of things (esp. electronics but even baby gear!) as I don't live in the U.S.  Paypal is universal :).  When I give a Paypal prize I just eat the fees and make sure the winner gets the fully promised amount.

My Personal Finance Journey said:

Oh wow. Thanks for sharing that SPF. I didn't know about the restrictions on giveaways for non-US readers. Will take that in to consideration. 

I can buy SOME stuff from amazon.com, but other items not allowed.  And Amazon.ca leaves a LOT to be desired.

Sustainable PF said:

I asked this elsewhere but I don't recall a response.

Why do people giveaway so many Amazon gift cards instead of cash from Paypal?

As stated, the fees are a big reason.  But also the search engine potential.  Every month I have run a giveaway, my biggest SE hits were "july amazon giftcard", "august amazon giftcard", "september amazon giftcard"…so I just kept rolling with it.  Referral traffic from sweepstakes/giveaway sites are still the biggest driver, but I get some SE traffic that signs up this way as well.