Originally posted on May 8th, 2013. Good advice doesn’t age.
David commented on my Facebook post yesterday:
Many tips I share are because of personal experience. I made the mistake(s), I learned how to do it better and I share my lessons with you. Creating a separate email address just for entering is one of them.
When I began entering on a daily basis in 2001 I used my personal email address. I used it for everything; work, connecting to family and friends and contesting. It slowly got out of control. To the point, I was getting hundreds of emails a day. It was time to separate my personal life from my hobby. I created a Yahoo email (Gmail was by invitation only at that point!) and began to slowly switching over all my entries.
It had to be planned out very carefully as I didn’t want to disqualify myself from anything I had already entered or contests that were still running. If I was already entering a daily contest with the old address, I continued to do so. If I was entering a new giveaway, I used the new address. It sounds like a simple enough system, and it was, but it was time-consuming. (The key to keeping myself from being disqualified and keep track of the entire transition, was to save each entry as a Passcard on RoboForm.)
It took a full year before I was 100% on the new email because many sweepstakes that have long entry periods, plus I wanted a buffer for delayed drawings. This is why I recommend those new to the hobby start out with a separate address to save them all the work it took me to change over.
So, David, you can do it (without disqualifying yourself), and I recommend you do. It’s just going to take time.
Do you have a separate email for winning?
…Great information Carolyn…I too had separate addresses at the beginning but one day made a mistake and the next thing I knew – boom – 5 million people on both email addresses…Personally I just didn’t have the ambition to switch so I just got rid of the one address and probably lost contests… I wish I had been more careful in the beginning.
As a (recovering) perfectionist I had to do the transition. The thought of potentially losing any prize was enough to give me a panic attack. Planning and executing such a long process was the only way to save my sanity. LOL!
Makes sense. I should probably transition as I currently have a @bellsouth.net account that I’ve had since I was a teenager at my parents’ house. I think they’ll deactivate my email when my parents no longer have bellsouth service. Argh…I dread the day….but I know it’s coming.
Thanks Carolyn for the excellent information! I have been in a non-winning drought for quite some time. I hope to turn it around.
Many thanks for this helpful and informative post.
Great post – since I’ve been entering contests for many years, my email has been hit with scams of every sort. Usually the clincher is the bad grammar 🙂 Nobody sends you a “legal letter” with spelling mistakes and sentance structure issues.
A related question? I have been playing RockPaperSkittles and the rules state using more than one email address “may” be disqualified. Now I have noticed 2 different names that use a capital letter in one of their names, and a small in another. So obviously they are using 2 different accounts. (E.g. Carolyn and carolyn) Can they do this? Thank you!
The potential disqualification of an entrant will change from company to company, rule set to rule set. It’s one reason I use RoboForm. No simple errors on my part. Having worked as a Contest Manager, I can assure you, all companies will screen in one way or another for cheaters and eliminate them before the final drawing.
I have received some of the obvious scams “You’ve won $10,000,000 in the British Lotto.” I do find I get a lot of Junk mail about male enhancements :S Thanks for the great post!
Thanks for this info. I’m in the process of switching over my husband’s email for him. It’s a lot of work, but it’s so much easier to have an email address specifically for sweepstakes.
I entered your “Secret” sweepstake. I really enjoy reading your emails. Thanks!
I too need to get another email address for my sweepstakes, or maybe just switch my personal one. It sounds like it will be alot of work, but worth it.
Thanks for the info. Looking forward to getting back into the contest mode. Stay Safe !!