A Few Bad Apples Can Spoil the Blog Contest Barrel 

There are many different reasons why a blogger might want to start a contest, but most of them boil down to getting links and promoting their blog.  And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, as long as you’re offering something of genuine value to the contest entrants and are running things honestly.  Unfortunately, in a few rare instances, neither of those are the case . . . and when someone experiences a blog contest or sweepstakes scam firsthand, it can tend to spoil the whole barrel for them and make them unlikely to ever enter another one. 

Our first hint that some bloggers might be running phony contests came when we uncovered a huge scam by a guy named Ashwin Khanna.  You can read all about it in depth, but it basically boiled down to a blogger promising a ridiculously large sum of money to a random reader who linked to him, then not delivering on the prize.  Although we exposed Ashwin Khanna as a fraud and helped destroy his online reputation in the process, he still got hundreds of backlinks from his scam contest and probably ended up walking away with a little extra cash in his wallet. 

And yes, we still see contests that are posted on the Contest Blogger Forum and other places on the Internet that we suspect are scams.  While we delete these suspected phonies from the forum, you can be sure that plenty of people are still fooled into giving out links, free publicity and even cash to blog contest and sweepstakes scammers.  In hopes of preventing that from happening, we’ve decided to compile a checklist of what to look for before you enter a blog contest. 

The Different Types of Blog Contest Scams 

Blog contest scams come in many different shapes and sizes, but they usually involve an effort by the scammer to get one of four things: links, publicity, subscribers or comments.  These four things are the mother’s milk of the Blogosphere, and an abundance of any of them can deliver tons of traffic, search engine juice, page rank and advertising money.  

Of course, legitimate blog contests also usually ask for one of those four things as an entry requirement, too, so it shouldn’t be looked at as an indicator of a scam artist.  The problem comes when bloggers use deceitful methods to gain entrants in their contests, don’t deliver on their promises, or cut and run before it’s time to deliver.  Generally, blog contest and sweepstakes scams take one of five forms: 

• The Setup: In this blog contest scam, the scammer promises to deliver a prize to a randomly chosen entrant.  And while he really does end up giving a prize to someone, it isn’t really random at all.  Instead, he chooses either a friend, a family member, or a the owner of a website which he thinks will give his blog the maximum publicity if he gives them the prize.  This kind of blog contest scam is extremely difficult to identify, since you can never know if someone is really choosing a random winner.
• The Fake:  In The Fake, there is never really a winner at all, but the scammer pretends that someone has been awarded a prize.  This is the type of blog contest scam that was run by Ashwin Khanna: he set up a phony blog himself, then claimed that it was the random winner of the huge cash prize.  If the scammer is really stupid, he won’t even set up a phony site and will neglect to even name the winner.
• The Quitter:  The Quitter is another popular blog contest scam, usually perpetuated by the laziest and most unoriginal scammers.  In this variation, the scammer gets tons of backlinks or subscribers, then just before it’s time to chose a winner, he cancels the contest.  He usually has a great excuse for cancelling, though, such as “I just didn’t get as many entrants as I thought I would.”
• The Changer:  The Changer is similar to The Quitter, but instead of cancelling, the scammer will change the rules right in the middle of the contest.  For instance, he might toss in a new entry requirement, such as subscribing to his blog in addition to linking back.
• The Fade Out:  This form is one of the most common, and rarely goes noticed since it’s usually perpetrated by bloggers with few readers.  The Fade Out happens when a blogger decides to cancel a contest he has started, but doesn’t even mention it on his blog.  Truthfully, The Fade Out usually doesn’t harm many people, since there are probably no entrants to cheat in the first place. 

How To Identify A Blog Contest Scam and Avoid Getting Cheated 

Sure, there are lots of different types of blog contest and sweepstakes scams, but luckily there are a few simple tips you can use to identify them pretty quickly.  Most of them are common sense, and it’s doubtful that many people will fall for a scam if they are even slightly savvy about how the Blogosphere works.  Still, for newer bloggers, here is a checklist of five things that should set off some alarms that you might be looking at a blog contest scam: 

• An Unrealisticly Large Prize: This is what tipped us off that Ashwin Khanna’s blog contest was probably a sham.  He was offering a $2,500 prize, which was completely unbelievable from a blog that had just kicked off and looked so unprofessional.
• A Crappy Blog:  It’s sad to say, but if someone’s blog is poorly put together and betrays no attention to detail or pride in their own work, then it is much more likely that their contest is a scam. 
• A Record of Scams:  This should go without saying, really.  Do a Google search on the blogger, and if they have perpetuated a scam before, don’t trust them now.
• Ridiculous Entry Requirements:  There’s nothing wrong with asking for a link, a feed subscription or a post comment to enter a blog contest.  But if they ask for all three, they are being a little too desperate.
• Any Kind of Entry Fee:  If someone asks you for bank account information or an entry fee, no matter how small, then don’t trust them.  Besides, if they are charging an entry fee to take part in their contest, then that makes it an online raffle, which is illegal.