Online Competition Tips... win win win win//// WIN\\\\ (Online Competition Tips...)

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Product:	Online Competition Tips...
Date:	04/06/02 (45 review reads)
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Advantages: The thrill of winning, I've won a lot of things in a short time

Disadvantages: Can be very time consuming, you have to enter a lot to win anything, it's very addictive!

I guess I’ve always been into ‘get rich quick schemes’. As a kid I was always conning my parents, uncles, aunts and grandparents into giving me money. Presenting them with paintings and clay sculptures then holding out my hand for a gratuity, demanding they buy my home-made stamps for Christmas cards, even building priceless items of ‘modern art’ out of Lego, then charging a pound for them before they were broken apart to make something else which I could sell back to them – for a small price. By secondary school however, I thought the days of money for nothing were well and truly gone. Everyone just accepts that in this day and age you just don’t get things for free – and if you do, there’s always a catch. Then came this online competition malarkey, and I became this cunning, scheming kid again.

I started entering just a few competitions at the start, and although this did actually pay off, I soon began to realise that if you’re out to win a lot, become a serious compaholic, you have to enter a large number to really rake in the prizes. So for starters you need to find a site full of UK competitions that you can constantly refer to, so you can check out what new prizes are on offer. There are new competitions to enter daily, so if you want to become a hard-core comper, it’s best you find a site that updates every day, so you don’t miss out on any opportunities. I’ve found the best of competition lists to be ‘www.loquax.co.uk’ and ‘www.competitions-online.co.uk’. But there are others you might want to try such as ‘www.prizestoday.co.uk’ and ‘www.prizes.co.uk’. It’s worth bearing in mind that all of these sites have been set up with people like me in mind. In other words, you’re up against ruthless prize-hungry sharks that will enter virtually every competition just for the thrill of winning. So if you’re truly sche
ming, you might want to hunt for competitions that the competition web sites haven’t got their mitts on. This can be a lengthy task, so all I do is just to keep my eyes pealed at all times when I’m surfing. Another thing to consider is that ‘loquax’ and ‘competitions online’ are both extremely well advertised, thus frequented. I think more compers use these sites to refer to daily that other lists of UK competitions, so if you can find a list that is just as comprehensive as these two but not as renowned, bookmark it and TELL NO-ONE! Well, you can, but I wouldn’t. Hell, I don’t even tell my mates how I’m winning all this stuff. I used to, but then it was sparking far too much interest and hey, I’m very competitive. Of course all these lists generally consist of the same competitions, so if you’re visiting more than one you have to have a very good memory or else you’ll probably end up entering a competition more than once, and they are very hot on this. Some permit you to enter daily, in which case bookmark the site and take full advantage of their kind offer. But I suppose if the web site doesn’t allow daily entries, but only asks you for your email address and you happen to have about 12 or so different email addresses to your name…

Unfortunately most will asks you for more details, so you can’t do this. Often they will ask you to register with the site or subscribe to their mailing list to be automatically entered in a competition. As I have many email addresses, I reserve one purely for entering competitions where you know they will inundate your inbox with junk. Since my Hotmail account tends to receive vast amounts of junk mail anyway I use this address for such competitions. However, don’t think that just because you tick all the ‘please do not contact me’ and ‘do not give my details to third-party companies’ boxes your mailbox wil
l remain junk mail free. You will get a lot of junk mail come your way even if your very careful. It’s the one downside of online competitions, but well worth it if you win a lot. It would however, be incredibly unwise to input a business email address. Instead, you should probably set-up one email address (at least) exclusively reserved for competition entries. Therefore if you get fed up with the online competition game and the junk mail, you can just disown your email account.

Occasionally a site will ask you to refer friends to increase your chance of winning. This is where it’s useful to have either some very patient mates or a couple of different email accounts to your name. I managed to convert a few of my best friends into compaholics so I can refer them for all sorts of things, and in return, give them permission to abuse my inbox. But it’s really not fair to give out your friends email addresses for numerous competitions just so you can increase your chances if you know it’ll annoy them senseless. They won’t thank you and they might find their email addresses being put on mailing lists, so what was just a one-off annoyance has become a major gripe. After all, they didn’t choose to sacrifice their email account for the possibility of prizes, so please be considerate! And don’t worry if your mates aren’t interested in your schemes, just set up an email account at ‘another.com’. They will give you one email account that allows you to have numerous email addresses all sending mail into the same inbox. Another reason why another.com are so good to have, and why I believe I may be winning so many competitions, is because I have an interesting memorably email address that stands out. Now I know that the competition organisers claim they pick winners randomly, but when I did a bit of work experience at a magazine and they asked us to pick the winners for write-in competitions ‘randomlyR
17;, what postcards do you think caught our eyes first, the plain white postcard? Or the large colourful one, with the photo of the cute puppy on the front? With this in mind, it might be worth getting a decent email address rather than something dull like ‘ee00lcj@brunel.ac..yada yada yada’. The problem with ‘another.com’ is it is under maintenance rather too often for my liking. Then again, if you’re only using this account for competition entries I suppose this doesn’t really matter much.

Here’s another tip for you; a lot of people (except hard-core compers) are put off from entering competitions hosted on sites they haven’t heard of or where the web page design leaves a lot to be desired. Use this to your advantage. If people are going to be uneasy about inputting their details onto web sites that aren’t particularly reputable, but you’re not fussed, you’ll stand a better chance. This chance will be increased even further if the web site isn’t well known, as it won’t have been visited as often, so you don’t have to compete against the mass of people that aren’t compaholics but are simply surfing the site and decided to give the competition a go. So far I haven’t won from any major sites like ‘BBC’/’Radiotimes’ for example, even though I’ve entered nearly all of their competitions. I did win on ‘beme.com’ once, but that was because in order to win you had to write about a film and competitions that involve writing more than a few words are deemed too much effort by a lot of people so they have few entrants. Also, competitions where the prize is very small (a bottle of shampoo or a pair of tights for example) may also not be considered worth time entering. But then you’re very likely to win if the prize is small and they have loads to give away, so providing it only involves entering your details and winning will
save you a few quid, it’s well worth doing. Most competitions do involve just entering your details, or answering a very simple question, though quite a few of the questions will be more taxing. If you don’t know the answer, cut and paste the question into a search engine like ‘ask.co.uk’ and you’re likely to get your answers in not much time. Many people can’t be bothered with this, if like me you can, this will increases your chances of winning. Also, don’t be put off if forms ask you for your company name or why you were visiting the site. If in doubt – lie! Ok, maybe it’s unethical, but they’re very unlikely to do their homework on you, especially if it’s only something small.

The most important thing about online competitions, and the reason why a lot of people don’t participate must be because they can take so much time if you enter a lot, and inputting your details over and over again can be incredibly tedious. I’m at an advantage since I’m a student with free Internet access, so it’s not costing me anything. But apart from the Internet call charges and time aspect, keeping motivated can prove difficult. If you don’t win anything you might start to think ‘why do I bother? Why do I spend all this time online and get inundated with junk mail when I don’t get anything in return?’ In truth, the only reason why after three months I’m such a devotee is because I win so often. Perhaps I’m just a very lucky person, or maybe it’s because I enter so many (around 40 or so a day) the law of averages dictates I am bound to win quite a lot, though my boyfriend seems to enter nearly as many competitions as I do and has only won once. But even now, having won over £90s worth of hair goodies, tickets to France, tickets to a film premiere and after-show party, CDs, 6 videos, a book, a signed film poster, a watch and a few other small pr
izes, I sometimes can’t be bothered with the whole thing. That is, until I get one of those exciting “congratulations!” emails and I’m back on my computer doing it all over again!

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