Running a contest, is it a good idea?

[Ikki]

Hi guys,

I've been running a blog for about 3 months now and felt curious about starting a competition to gain more readers/visitors, increase back links to my site and of course gain more popularity among other webmasters.

The thing is: is it really possible to achieve all those with a contest? Are they still attractive? Well, I've put this question into a test lab and right now I've started a competition on my blog. The topic: Writing a How To post. I'll be picking 5 random winners using random.org to select them.

Once the contest has finished, I'll post back here my experiences with it. Maybe my errors (if any hehe) will help you when you run your own competitions :)

Cheers!

[Nazreen]

I think that the contests here in the BAF forums has attracted some of the people from HB forums but not that much. In your competition, I would suggest that the winner not be chosen randomly using random.org but chosen according to the "How to" post's contents. If you like, you can also put your contest to a vote to decide who wins.

Good luck with your contest Ikki!

[Hurbel2k]

I'd like some stats for comparison. How is the situation (visitors, backlinks) now?

[Ikki]

In your competition, I would suggest that the winner not be chosen randomly using random.org but chosen according to the "How to" post's contents. If you like, you can also put your contest to a vote to decide who wins.I also thought of this. However, starting a poll to chosse the winners of the competition might not be that good. People could just try to vote for themselves several times and/or ask friends/relatives to continuosly vote for them in order to get the prizes.

I'm open to new suggestions about this so if any of you have a good idea I'd love to hear it!

[Ikki]

I'd like some stats for comparison. How is the situation (visitors, backlinks) now?I'm not sure about your query, Hurbel2k. Want to see my blog's stats before the competition started or what it currently has with it running?

[Nazreen]

I also thought of this. However, starting a poll to chosse the winners of the competition might not be that good. People could just try to vote for themselves several times and/or ask friends/relatives to continuosly vote for them in order to get the prizes.

I'm open to new suggestions about this so if any of you have a good idea I'd love to hear it!

I thought that you can only vote once in a poll. Anyway, if it's your blog then I guess that it would be better if you'd be the judge of the competition. In order to do this, you must always appear to be fair and not having any favorites. Please don't let past performance affect your objectivity in choosing the winner. If it's a "How to" post, it would be better if you judge according to content and not just the length of the post. Remember that quality comes first before quantity.

[Swastik]

Personally, I think that it is a good idea to start a contest. There has been a wave of blog contests in the past few months, to be honest. However, it should be attractive enough for your users.

However, as per as the criteria of choosing the winners stands, it should not be a problem till your blog readers don't have any problem. If they do, you should consider a change in the process.

Best of Luck

[Fergal]

As has already been mentioned there has been lots of blog contests recently. Running a contest can help attract new visitors to your site, if you promote the contest and it can also help to build loyalty amongst your existing visitors.

I see that you are considering running a contest to increase back links to your blog. You need to be careful with this. Search engines endeavour to reward natural links, they sometimes penalise paid links, because they view them as being artificial.

For small competitions they most probably won't notice or penalise your blog. But, it is worth being conscious of this as your blog gets more popular and having more of an impact on search engine traffic.

[Mujahid]

In my opinion, running a contest is really a good idea. The contest really help you in attracting members to your site. But you must have a good price for the contest otherwise few people are gonna take interest in your contest. Offering visitors e currency is a good option when running a contest.

[devilbatista]

Runny a contest is really a good idea. This will not attract the visitors but they will also stay at your forum or blog or site if they find the competition is better offering good price and prizes and running well.

[Nazreen]

...I see that you are considering running a contest to increase back links to your blog. You need to be careful with this. Search engines endeavour to reward natural links, they sometimes penalise paid links, because they view them as being artificial.

Fergal and guys, how will search engines know that the increased traffic in the blog was generated through the use of a contest?

[Fergal]

Fergal and guys, how will search engines know that the increased traffic in the blog was generated through the use of a contest?
I think that it is very unlikely that they will see it if your blog is not a hugely popular one. However, there is always the chance that a search engine will see that you are running a competition to encourage people to link to you, and punish your site's search engine rankings for that.

Search engines don't have a problem with competitions that encourage people to visit your site. They do have a problem with competitions that encourage people to link to your site.