Category Archives: Contests

Group Writing Project: I am a Judge

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Over on Blog Design Studio there is a little contest going on and I am one of three judges involved in selecting the winner. The other two judges are Jeff Chandler, my PerfCast co-host, and Alex Christache, a well known blogger.

The winner will get a free custom WordPress theme from the team at Blog Design Studio, and the writing project runs until the end of November, so I suggest you get over there if you want a chance at winning a custom WordPress theme.

What do you need to write about?

Here are some of the examples of topic :

1. How blog design will change your blog’s value?
2. Why a blog design is important for your blog’s authority?
3. 10 tips to keep in mind before you get your blog designed!

For more details check out their post on Blog Design Studio.

Originally posted on November 13, 2008 @ 12:06 pm

Win Two Hours Consulting Time from Me

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Right now, over on the Blogging Tips forum, you have a chance to win two hours of my time, where I will help you with your blog, share my knowledge, answer questions you might have about advertising or SEO, and more!

How do you enter? Just answer the following question on the Blogging Tips Forum:

What is the one blog that has a balance of great design, strong branding and excellent content in your mind, and please defend your selection?

You only have a few days to enter though before the contest moves onto the next prize, so get on there soon to have a shot at winning the prize.

Originally posted on November 5, 2008 @ 11:47 am

XFEP Reader Interaction Contest Draw

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Some of you might remember that I was running a contest a little while back now called the XFEP Reader Interaction Contest. I have since tallied up the entries and was pleased to find that I had a fair number of entrants, though I included all of the people that followed me on twitter during the contest, even if they hadn’t followed me because of the contest, and I included those that commented on this blog, even if they didn’t comment knowing it would be an point towards them in this contest.

Using Random.org and a spread sheet of entrants, I began selecting winners for the prizes. For those of you that don’t remember what was up for grabs, jump on over to the previous post related to the contest, and take a gander.

And now for the winners…

125×125 Banner on Xfep for 3 months
– Ryan Caldwell

One 468×60 banner on Xfep for 3 months
– John Leschinski

BuyWPThemes.com
– Angela Robson

Celebreader.com
– Kneale Mann

DesignRanked.com (and DesignRankd.com if winner wants it)
– Jason Fredin

FabCeleb.com
– Kiltak

HealthNewsFirst.com
– Jeffro

OneBigCanada.com (.biz, .info and .net if winner wants them)
– Jeff Pulver

TheBlogJob.com
– Lisa Sabin-Wilson

UpRanked.com (and UpRankd.com if the winner wants it)
– James Mowery

One Hour Blog Consulting from Me
– Kevin Muldoon

One Copy Each of Problogger: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income
– Katy Castro
– maheshkale
– Tom Leroux

I will be in contact with the winners as soon as possible (though feel free to contact me if you’ve won) to make sure all prizes are distributed. If any prize winner declines their prize, I will select using Random.org once again until we find a suitable winner.

Originally posted on August 18, 2008 @ 12:36 am

What Do I Expect from My Contest?

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So, I have been asked more than once over the last few days what I hope to achieve from my Reader Interaction Contest, and so I wanted to address that here.

My only hope for the contest is that I get one entrant per prize listed. No more, no less. I hope that I have enough readers on this blog that would be willing to leave a comment or Twitter about the contest that I can give everything away without anything being left over, or anyone being sad that they didn’t win anything.

Do I expect to get a huge boost in rankings, back links, comments, new readers? Heck no! If that is what I wanted, I would have done the normal thing, and had people promote it heavily, got more people involved in making it this big deal, and went around to the contest blogs and got it listed.

This contest really is just for my friendly readers. So if you like this blog, leave a comment and you will be entered. So far, I think only half of the prizes have been accounted for.

Originally posted on July 22, 2008 @ 10:33 pm

XFEP Reader Interaction Contest

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Contest Time!

I have decided to run a small contest to giveaway a few things as a reward to the great readers of this site that constantly participate and make blogging here such a great experience. I haven’t run many contests before, but I have always enjoyed giving things away, and so I figured it was time to try my hand at it once again.

Prize Pool

Three Copies of Problogger: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income by Darren Rowse and Chris Garrett – An amazing book for any skill level and worth far more than the twenty-five dollar list price on the back of the book. Problogger is already in its second printing and includes some very timeless advice. I have read the book cover to cover more than a few times now. Prize includes shipping fees from me to the winner anywhere in the world.

Various Domains registered at Godaddy.com – Each domain has a different expiry date, but if you have been looking for a great property to build that next project on, no doubt one of the below will probably inspire you. As winners of domains are selected, they will get first choice on which domain, or domains where listed as a possible package, that they would like.

  • BuyWPThemes.com
  • CelebReader.com
  • DesignRanked.com (and DesignRankd.com if winner wants it)
  • FabCeleb.com
  • HealthNewsFirst.com
  • OneBigCanada.com (.biz, .info and .net if winner wants them)
  • TheBlogJob.com
  • UpRanked.com (and UpRankd.com if the winner wants it)

One Hour Blog Consulting from Me – with a list value of fifty dollars, I believe that an hour of my time, one on one in any medium you desire, could be a huge opportunity for your blog to grow in exciting new ways. Looking to monetize, but you are confused on how to make more than a coffee worth of money per day? Wanting to leverage your content better? Trying to figure out how to promote things better in the social media world? Issues with your WordPress theme? I will use my expertise, and connections to help you with your blog.

One 468×60 Banner on the front page of Xfep.com for 3 months – with a value of $360, adding your non-animated banner just above the title of each and every single post on Xfep.com as well as above the first post title on the front page will allow your brand to be noticed resulting in new traffic to your blog.

One 125×125 Banner on Xfep.com for 3 months – with a value of $120, you will be able to add your square advertisement graphic above all others on Xfep.com for three months. The exposure could mean new readers, new subscribers, and the chance to promote your own products, services, contests, or just your brand. Building brand equity is invaluable.

How to Enter

I wanted to make it easy to enter, but I also wanted those willing to go the extra mile able to have more chances at the above prizes, and so like many successful contests, I have built in a system where the more things you do, the more entries you get.

One Ticket Each

  • Relevant and Approved Comment on Xfep.com
  • Follow me on Twitter – davidcubed
  • Invite me to a beta for a service I am not yet a member of. [dave.phoenix at gmail.com]
    Brightkite is off the list
    Aviary is off the list
  • Twitter about this contest (don’t forget to let me know)

Two Tickets Each

  • Promote Posts from Xfep.com on popular Social Media promotion sites like Digg, StumbleUpon, Reddit, Delicious or Sphinn. Make sure to contact me through the contact form with the relevant details of what you did, or it won’t be counted.
  • Post about this contest on your blog (250 words or above to qualify)

Five Tickets Each

  • Submit guest post for Xfep.com that gets approved (over 500 words).
  • Talk about Xfep, or one of its posts on your own blog (excluding the contest post). Add to the conversation.
  • Purchase an advertisement on Xfep.com

Winner Selection

Eligible participants will be randomly given a number or numbers dependent on how many ways they enter. Once numbers have been put into a spreadsheet and double checked for accuracy, I will run a random number generator online with a randomized hash as the seed for the random number generator. I will start with the domains, and then the advertisement positions, consulting, and finally the three copies of the books. Winners will be removed from the spreadsheet so that they cannot win multiple prizes.

Important Dates

Contest Open: Friday, July 18th, 2008
Contest Closed: Friday, August 15th, 2008 @ 11:59 PM EDT (GMT-4) [2359 hours]
Draw: Monday, August 18th, 2008
All Prizes Awarded by: September 1st, 2008

Originally posted on July 17, 2008 @ 10:23 pm