Savor the Success

I've wanted to hold a contest at Project Happily Ever After for a while. After all, all of the blogging experts keep telling me that contests are one of the fastest ways to build exposure for a blog. Yet, I've been stymied for many months.

What should I give away? How do I figure out who wins? How do I make sure people ever find out about the contest in the first place?


Now, after months of reading about contests and studying other people's contests, I've created a strategy. I will write about it here, so the rest of you can learn both from what I do right---as well as from what I do wrong. And, if you have advice along the way, I'd love to hear that, too. Please leave it in the comments area, so others who read this blog can learn with me.


I'm a former newspaper reporter, so I'll give you the run-down on my contest with the 5 Ws and H:


Who: Alisa Bowman


What: Is giving away a Nintendo Wii, along with many other to be determined assorted other prizes.


Where: www.projecthappilyeverafter.com


When: The first two weeks in February.


Why: To build backlinks, increase email subscriptions, and build word-of-month (or word-of-click) advertising for her blog.


How: The person with the most points wins. Here's how people can earn points:

• Unlimited points: Write a paragraph about why people should check out Alisa's site. Send your email to as many friends as possible. Earn 1 point for each person you copy on your email. Earn 50 bonus points if every single person copied in your email subscribes to Alisa's blog.

• 10 points: Subscribe by email to Alisa's blog

• 50 points: Write a blog about Alisa or about her blog, linking back to her blog at least twice.

• 15 points: Leave a comment about your favorite second place prize.

• 25-100 points: Win the Project Happily Ever After Haiku contest. Send Alisa Haiku (three lines of poetry that do not rhyme) about marriage, relationships or sex. Project Happily Ever After readers will vote mid February on their favorite entry. The person with the most votes wins. First place will be awarded 100 points, second place 50 votes, and third place 25 points.

Based on the number of points, people will win various prizes, ranging in value from the Wii ($250 value) to a bag of organic coffee beans from my husband's coffee shop (I have no idea of the value, but I will know by the time I run the contest.)


So, I'm thinking you might have the following questions.


Why a Wii?


I need other people (hopefully some of you at STS) to donate other prizes to this contest. I'm hoping that my own donation of the Wii will show you just how serious I am about getting exposure for your products. The Wii is also the hottest gadget out there. Don't you think, "Win a free Wii!" will spread like rapid fire as a Retweet?


Why the points system?


I wanted to give people multiple ways to win. Every time I came up with a system that included just one way to win, it left out various folks. For instance, if the contest only involved writing a blog about my blog-it would leave out everyone who does not have a blog. If it only involved signing up for the email subscriptions, it would leave out everyone who has already subscribed. I do not want to alienate my dedicated base! I added the comments about the second place prizes in order to encourage people to look at all of the prizes beyond the Wii. That ensures that the wonderful people who donate prizes to my contest will get click throughs and more exposure for their products. And, heck, I thought the Haiku contest would be crazy fun.


Why would anyone want to donate product as a prize?


I'm hoping this contest earns your product as much exposure as it earns my blog. I plan to write up what's great about each prize in my own voice, giving each a unique personal plug.


How will I spread the word about the contest?


Oh, the usual. I'll Tweet it and ask my Tweeps to Retweet. I'll repeatedly post it to Facebook. I'll write about it here. I will spam family and friends. I'll do social bookmarking and social networking like nobody's business. And I'll look into getting a little PR, too.


So what do you all think? Do you want to donate a prize? Email me alisab@ptd.net. Do you have suggestions for better ways I can run the contest? Leave a comment!

Alisa Bowman blogs about the ups and downs of marriage at www.projecthappilyeverafter.com.