Rafflecopter: The easy way to do a giveaway

Giveaways can be a great way to create some buzz about your book and encourage engagement with fans and potential readers. When it comes to setting up a giveaway I nearly always go with Rafflecopter. It makes doing a giveaway super easy to do.

Screenshot from Rafflecopter.com



What is Rafflecopter?

For this answer I'll let Rafflecopter do the talking and use a quote from their website.

"Rafflecopter is the world's easiest way to run a giveaway online. Rafflecopter allows you to customize and embed an entry form on your site that incentivizes your audience to perform tasks in exchange for entries into a sweepstakes. Customize your widget and place it anywhere HTML is accepted, whether it’s on your Wordpress blog, your Facebook page, or both. Provide the promotion details, plug in the prize, and you’re off and collecting entries.
The more entries completed by entrants, the better chance they have of winning, and the more interaction your promotion receives, helping you grow your community."


How much does it cost?

The basic version of Rafflecopter is completely free to use and gives you unlimited giveaways. You can embed it anywhere and have it pick random winners from the entrees.

There are paid subscriptions available too if you want to take it to the next level and add things like photo's of the prizes, remove Rafflecopter branding, etc... You can find out more about those here: https://www.rafflecopter.com/pricing/


Where can it be used?

Anywhere you can embed code. Rafflecopter is super flexible as it allows you to embed the giveaway code for the widget anywhere. This means you can use it on your website, blog, or even share the link via any of your social media channels.

You can even do a Flash Facebook Giveaway using the features on site as a way of giving back to your fans.

What prizes can I offer?

Any prizes you want to. It's completely up to you. 

N.B. The prize doesn't have to be a copy of your book. Whilst it's automatic to think of giving away a free copy or copies of your book as the prize, don't limit yourself to just that. If you offer a print copy as the prize make it a signed print copy with a personalised dedication to the winner. So much more special than a standard copy sent from the printer. Also consider other prizes like book swag (bookmarks, keyrings, magnets, etc...). Think about the topics covered in your book and see if you can come up with a prize that's related to the book in some way. e.g. does you book feature a fashion obsessed character? Giveaway a scarf like the one she wears in the book. Does your character use a magic ring? Giveaway a ring that looks like the one in your book. Does your book have lots of illustrations? Giveaway a framed illustration signed by the illustrator. You get the idea. Don't think "just book". Think "connected to the book".

How do I pick and contact a winner?

I'm going to use the Rafflecopter answer for this one too as they sum it up so well on their site.

"Choosing a winner with Rafflecopter is easy! Rafflecopter gives you the tools that help you a) randomly select a number of winners from your entrants pool b) help you verify the winners' entries & c) announce the winners directly on the widget. 
a) After your giveaway ends, sign into your Rafflecopter account and find the giveaway's 'entries' tab where you'd normally moderate entries by clicking on 'pick a winner' or moderate. Clicking on the 'ADD A WINNER' button will generate 1 random entry from your entry pool. For 5 winners, click 'add a winner' 5 times. The # of winners you choose isn't correlated with the number of prizes in your giveaway.
b) To verify the winners' entries, view your entries by clicking on the 'SHOW ME THE ENTRIES' button. You can sort entries by IP, name, email address, etc.. To contact your winners for the first time, we recommend simply emailing them at the email address provided. You can also download a list of your entrants into a .csv format that will include your entrants' name, email, entry option info, IP address, timestamp, etc.
Download this list from the bottom of your giveaway's entries tab by clicking on 'EXPORT ENTRIES TO EXCEL', which will email you a spreadsheet. We recommend contacting your winners via the email address they provided.
c) Finally, when you've completed choosing your giveaway's winner(s) and you're ready to display them directly on the widget, click the 'DISPLAY WINNERS' button."

Do you use Rafflecopter when doing your giveaways or do you use another tool? Are you running a Rafflecopter giveaway at the moment? Share the links in the comments section below and tell us about how you're doing giveaways as part of your marketing plan.
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