Tips for a Successful Blog Giveaway

feltmeupdesigns says:

Hi I am a well established etsy seller and have just ran my latest blog competition/giveaway to celebrate my 500th sale. Quite a few people have been asking me if it works so I thought a post here would be a good idea. Why Give it away? Is probably the first and most obvious question. Why do a giveaway at all? Well there are many reasons, first of all is it's fun... if you don't enjoy it don't do it, personally I love running giveaways... I like the warm feeling inside when I get to make someone smile and you get feedback on your work and your shop! secondly one of the main reasons you run a giveaway is to increase traffic to you shop/site/blog/twitter/facebook thirdly, what does traffic equal? well... sales hopefully! Setting up your giveaway. I try and create a bit of a buzz before a giveaway, this time I posted on my facebook and twitter for a couple of weeks in advance saying things like "2 more sales and I'll start the next blog competition" or "I'm running a giveaway soon, what do you think I should giveaway?" Asking a question means you are involving your fans/followers... they aren't just sat there passively. My followers demanded an owl giveaway this time... they were most insistent!  Think about your prize(s) You want to giveaway something with a value too, something people will actually want... no point in offering a gift certificate for $10 for your shop if everything you sell is $30! When you set out your blog post for you giveaway be very clear about what the rules are and what your prize is. Does the prize have a value? Make sure you mention it. How will you draw the winner? What date does the competition close? How does a person enter this wonderful competition? Make sure your rules for entering the competition/giveaway include visiting your shop... "visit my shop and tell me what your favorite item is" this means people will spend time browsing your shop and hopefully have a chance to fall in love with items, heart them and come and buy them later! I include a link to my facebook fan page and twitter and offer extra entries if the person becomes a fan and/or twitters the giveaway. DON'T (and this is important and a rookie mistake which I made on my first giveaway!) DON'T ask for email addresses if your comments are public. I ask for people to leave a facebook, twitter or etsy user name where I can contact them... if people have to leave an email address make sure to let them know to do it in the format myemailaddress (at) whateverdotcom... this will protect peoples privacy a bit.  Promote your giveaway... you can't just post it and rest on your laurels. You need to work at it and bring people to you and your shop... post links and announcements on facebook and twitter daily... but remember to limit it to a few a day, there's nothing worse than a whole facebook feed full of someone spouting about the same thing over and over again. I limited myself to 1 in the morning and one in the evening and no more than 1 per hour on twitter. I find it's good to give people updates on the competition too. Post in forums you frequent, teams you are in etc... the more exposure the better. Also there are many sites that will promote your giveaway for you http://etsygiveaways.blogspot.com/ is one i use... but there are many more. Drawing your giveaway... use a random number generator or the good old names in a hat method which always works... I had more than 300 entries when all counted up so I used http://www.random.org/ Announcing the winner... First contact the winner to congratulate them asking for address and if you have a choice of prize the prize they would like. The make a big announcement to say who's won, you want people to look at your blog again so when you announce the winner on facebook or twitter be enigmatic "We have a winner, is it you? Visit the blog to see!"  Then this is where you make it all worth while... you offer the people who didn't win a consolation prize of a discount at your shop. I offered free postage with a discount code to be put in notes to seller. So then, does it work? Well... I have 15 more blog followers, 104 more facebook fans, loads more twitter fans... loads more shop hearts not to mention the item hearts... oh and I have had several sales using my code. So yes... it works! Source: http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php?thread_id=6551580&utm_source=bronto&utm_medium=email&utm_term=http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php%3Fthread_id%3D6551580&utm_content=etsy_success_070810&utm_campaign=etsy_success_070810