Comping - Winning and Losing Competitions online

Comping - Competition entrant hobbiest

Well, I'm stuck at home for a few hours to kill before heading over to the dentist for a 11:30 appointment. So I thought I would attempt to claw some time back by doing something productive. In this case - hunting for freebies in combination with a winning buzz. 

Especially with the onset of the recession, comping as a hobby has grown massively. It is an opportunity - particularly if you are on a limited income and have spare time - to enjoy some of the glamour not usually in your price range. Or that, at least is what they tell you. 

So I thought I would spend some time over this week trying my luck online. 

The first place for all my searching is usually Google - the worlds largest search engine. 

This lead me over to Martin's Money Supermarket website. He's put together a super helpful guide for anyone who wants to give this comping thing a go. The best bit of advice is to create yourself a new email address - the best way to avoid your normal email box filling with spam! 

After looking through the guide, I then headed over to the to the forums to start on my competition winning spree. Quickly, I realised the easiest way to keep track of all the entries and daily comps was an old favourite - an Excel Spreadsheet. 

My first mistake - try to avoid time wasting competitions. Especially if you want to try and fit as many entries in as possible. Time wasting became a serious issue on the Dorset Cereal website. I got dragged into playing mini games with the promise of points to go towards a competition. Clever marketing wise - as it also encourages you to share and compete with friends - but not if your purpose is win. 

A really great place to get through a huge amount of entries quickly is the Take a Break website. It is packed full of a huge range of competitions. Will let you know if I win any! Most of them have a few months before the final closing date. But you can enter daily to increase your chances of winning.

The problem is deciding what is and what is not actually worth entering. Do I need a child's potty? No. I have no kids yet or any friends in the country with little ones. So totally a waste of time to enter. I also do not know what I would do with a bright pink laptop - I like to also know what the specs of the laptop are before I have one. 

I'm about an hour into my competition marathon. Having got distracted by Dorset Cereal comp site I have only entered 14 competitions so far. Don't think I've won anything yet. But will have to check the emails later on. Hopefully with brighten up the day post dentist?!? 

My current worry is that if I did win any of these prizes - where would I put them? Hopefully I will be able to upgrade a few things at home and donate some of my old - but useable - bits to the charity shop.

The question is why would you do this to yourself? Are you are one of those people who spend a lot of time on the internet. If the answer is yes than this could be something that you might want to investigate some time in. Supposedly there is a theory to doing this properly and winning a higher proportion of competitions. But I have no idea how much or if that would make any difference....

But if you do decide to take up this winning baton that please let me know.

Best of luck!