Have you seen that episode on Oprah where they show this couple that lives a pretty good lifestyle with no job between them other than to simply enter all sweepstakes they can find and turn entering sweepstakes into a fine art? Thanksgiving?s done, the holiday season is imminent, and no company large or small feels quite safe letting this publicity opportunity go by: the holiday sweepstakes deluge is upon us.
The Internet is just so tailor-made for things like holiday sweepstakes. But while the rest of the world runs after the virtual world, you could improve your chances considering the opportunities out there in the real world too. It feels better keeping from exposing your e-mail ID too, saving yourself a little spam. But of course the Internet has the most opportunities in holiday sweepstakes; consider making out a separate e-mail ID just for your sweepstakes activities. This should keep your real e-mail ID free of unwanted spam. Some people believe that entering sweepstakes by snail mail somehow improves their odds. That one has proven so far to only be a myth; it could have roots in a real useful fact though: some sweepstakes will not allow more than one entry when entering online, but will accept multiple entries via snail mail. In that case, you should certainly go for it.
It’s difficult to pick the right holiday sweepstakes to enter, there being so many. Try to go for quality over quantity, and take ones by companies that are reputed. Some smaller sweepstakes are just put out there to be able to harvest a bunch of e-mail IDs to send spam out to. You need to keep an eye out for those. Consider subscribing to a well-known sweepstakes newsletter; as a basic rule, it’s best to just enter a few choice sweepstakes, but to maximize your chances by entering multiple times. If you just get tired typing in your details all the time, consider downloading a trial version of RoboForm that will fill out forms automatically for you.
Of course lots of people are wary of anything that sounds like holiday sweepstakes, going by the adage, ?there is no such thing as a free lunch?. This is not really true in the case of sweepstakes; but there are shady characters who believe that people who go in for sweepstakes are easy to take and will try a few tricks. So a few general rules do apply to keep safe this holiday season. The number one rule is, never give anyone money to enter any sweepstakes; it actually happens to be illegal for anyone to charge for this. You may also want to consider the actual cost of entering one by text message. Those text messages cost about a dollar and with confirmation messages and the like, could end up costing you about five dollars each time you enter.
Some fraudulent holiday sweepstakes enterprises will try something like the Nigeria scam by asking you to send money for taxes first, before they send you your winnings. That simple rule mentioned first is really to be taken literally. It is important to never entertain any requests for money, whichever way it is expressed. Funny business like this often comes out of foreign holiday sweepstakes, based in places like Mexico, Eastern Europe or Asia. Once you have these rules down, try spinning the wheel. People really are known to win.
