Comments on: When entering an online giveaway, is giving an e-mail necessary when you’ve left your blog link? http://www.bloggingbasics101.com/2008/05/when-entering-a/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=rss Tips & instructions for beginning and intermediate bloggers. Tue, 07 Sep 2010 00:35:20 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.1 By: Lizzie http://www.bloggingbasics101.com/2008/05/when-entering-a/comment-page-1/#comment-631 Lizzie Fri, 02 May 2008 00:16:54 +0000 http://www.bloggingbasics101.com/?p=200#comment-631 Oh I JUST went through this with the last Bloggy Giveaway. As Liz said, it's time-consuming and more than a little annoying to have to go on a blog expedition to track down winners, especially when you consider that for this particular giveaway carnival there are usually hundreds of entries. I was as blunt as I could possibly be for this last giveaway: <a href="http://lizzieshome.com/2008/04/26/bloggy-giveaway-winner/" rel="nofollow">http://lizzieshome.com/2008/04/26/bloggy-giveaway-winner/</a> I made it obvious that I required an email address to be written in full with each comment, and not to rely on the blog link (I also did the spelling out 'at' and 'dot' too - fell for the scraper-bot thing myself during the giveaway in early Feb and had to change emails after being inundated with spam - not fun). I must have stressed the point of including an email in the comment a bazillion times. I STILL had people who didn't pay attention to the directions. The first few I let through but in the end I had to delete over 10% of my entries (something like 20 people) because because honestly? It ticked me off that people were in such a rush to enter a comp that they totally ignored instructions. I feel very, very bad for deleting entries but sheesh. I also thought it was unfair for the folk who did pay attention. Leave in the invalid entries and the good guys' chances of winning drop. Cheers, Lizzie Oh I JUST went through this with the last Bloggy Giveaway. As Liz said, it’s time-consuming and more than a little annoying to have to go on a blog expedition to track down winners, especially when you consider that for this particular giveaway carnival there are usually hundreds of entries.

I was as blunt as I could possibly be for this last giveaway:

http://lizzieshome.com/2008/04/26/bloggy-giveaway-winner/

I made it obvious that I required an email address to be written in full with each comment, and not to rely on the blog link (I also did the spelling out ‘at’ and ‘dot’ too – fell for the scraper-bot thing myself during the giveaway in early Feb and had to change emails after being inundated with spam – not fun). I must have stressed the point of including an email in the comment a bazillion times. I STILL had people who didn’t pay attention to the directions. The first few I let through but in the end I had to delete over 10% of my entries (something like 20 people) because because honestly? It ticked me off that people were in such a rush to enter a comp that they totally ignored instructions. I feel very, very bad for deleting entries but sheesh. I also thought it was unfair for the folk who did pay attention. Leave in the invalid entries and the good guys’ chances of winning drop.

Cheers,
Lizzie

]]> By: Pink Lemonade Liz http://www.bloggingbasics101.com/2008/05/when-entering-a/comment-page-1/#comment-630 Pink Lemonade Liz Thu, 01 May 2008 12:46:48 +0000 http://www.bloggingbasics101.com/?p=200#comment-630 I actually started a new contest this morning and this time I did require that an email address be left in the comment field. Last contest, it took me a considerable amount of time to track down email addresses from profiles on blogger, and then I still couldn't find some addresses - what a waste of my time! I'd rather be writing great content than clicking fifty links to hoepfully find an email address. I actually started a new contest this morning and this time I did require that an email address be left in the comment field. Last contest, it took me a considerable amount of time to track down email addresses from profiles on blogger, and then I still couldn’t find some addresses – what a waste of my time! I’d rather be writing great content than clicking fifty links to hoepfully find an email address.

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