Are You Making These Sweepstakes Mistakes?

When entering sweepstakes, there are rules and guidelines we all must follow.

We know that! But, did you know that there are other mistakes you could be making that are costing you chances to win? That’s right!

Everything from using the wrong kinds of form fillers on your computer to leaving off small pieces of information could be an easy fix that will keep you in the running for your favorite prizes and make it feel like sweepstakes are easy to win.

Let me tell you all about the most common sweepstakes mistakes I see that can be easily remedied!

1. Check your email daily! (you might have a winner notification)

I know that sounds so simple, right?

BUT, there are lots of people out there who make an email address for the sole purpose of using it just for contests or freebies. They don’t check their email often enough and then suddenly BLAM. They’ve received an email stating they’ve won.

A lot of sweepstakes companies give you a small window (only a couple days) for you to claim your prize. If you only check that email address every couple weeks, you could miss out on an awesome prize by not seeing the winning email.

How can you fix that? Make sure you add the best sweepstakes sites to your contacts list and mark their emails as “important” so you’ll always see them. That will help you find their emails in a crowded inbox.

2. Read The Rules

We all click through so many hundreds of websites on the internet these days that we’ve gotten to the point where we check that box that says “I agree to the rules” without ever paying attention to the rules themselves!

So, make sure you read the rules of the contest sites. Some may state that you must be a certain age in order to enter, live in a certain area, or meet other kinds of requirements.

What a bummer it would be if you won the prize and then realized you are disqualified because you didn’t read the rules, right?

Reading those rules takes about 5 minutes of your time. You only have to do it once. But it will save you a major headache later!

3. Giving Up Too Soon

I’ve seen this happen way too often.

You’ll start entering a sweepstakes. But you'll give up in a week or two. Maybe even a month later.

You'll give up up because you feel burnt out or feel like it was a waste of time. Or even feel like you should've won instead of somebody else.

I’ve received emails from users stating that SweepstakesAlerts is a scam because they haven’t won after a week. And that they'll never enter the giveaway again!

Sweepstakes are random! You can’t be made a winner. There is no differentiating between someone playing one week and one year.

With sweepstakes, persistence pays off big time. We all want to win the best sweepstakes and fast. But we have to put time and effort into these sweepstakes. There are people who have gone a few years with entering (without wins) and then all of a sudden, they won the BIG PRIZE!

Believe me, all the time spent entering is worth it when you finally win. I’ve been there! I entered for a year each month to win a book from my favorite author. I didn’t give up, though, and I finally won after 13 entries (that’s 13 months).

4. Complaining To The Sweepstakes Site About Not Winning

I see so many people complain about not winning sweepstakes. They email to tell the company they’re giving up altogether!

I can tell you that complaining to the sweepstakes site about your chances of winning, not liking who won, or any other thing will not help your chances.

Not only that, but it makes you feel negative! And, as we all know, feeling negative does not help with your chances of winning a sweepstakes.

The people who run these sites work very hard to keep things fair for everyone so that you have a great chance to win. While doing that, they’re also working hard to find money to get new prizes for all the awesome users on their site!

5. Reading The Rules. But Not Following Them!

This is the worst mistake you can make with a sweepstakes site.

Each sweepstakes site puts a set of rules in place to keep their users safe and give them the best chance possible at winning fairly.

If one user doesn’t obey the rules, it messes up the chances for every user in the site. I know that my favorite sweepstakes site, PrizeGrab is safe, because they make sure there are no duplicate email addresses in their database entering for prizes and getting duplicate entries.

That’s in their rules! And they hold everyone accountable. So, make sure when you enter a sweepstakes, you not only read the rules, but follow them! It will also keep you from being disqualified if you do win!

Thanks for reading my 5 awesome tips on entering sweepstakes mistake free! If you have any questions at all about what kinds of mistakes you may be making (or need tips on how to win), feel free to contact me and ask away!

Remember, folks, sweepstakes are best won when fair for everyone. And, I wish you great luck with your entries!

As always, make today better than yesterday,

Tom Barker