I have done so many different things over the years to supplement our income or sometimes as the only income we had coming in at times. One of the more fun things I did was to enter giveaways. Would I call I a job? Well it did about as good as some of the data entry jobs I have had but don’t quit your day job.

I resisted getting started entering giveaways at first while someone I know entered every day. After about a year of seeing her get packages every week in the mail containing things she won absolutely free, I decided to give it a try.

Now there are tons of giveaways you can find for free on the internet. Simply doing a Google search with the word “giveaway” will pull up tons. Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest can also be used to search for giveaways for free.

Because this person I know had used it successfully, I signed up for https://www.online-sweepstakes.com. It was easy to use and after seeing the amount of the prizes add up that she won I felt it was worth the “investment”. They have different payment options and even a free option but I chose the $30 for a year payment. I signed up on Dec. 22, 2014. There is also a site called Sweepstakes Advantage that you can use the same way.

I won my first prize on 12/29/14 from Bookaholics Romance Club. I won “The Life Intended” book. The next day I won Valerian Sleep Aid from Peanut Butter and Whine blog. And I was hooked. Wow, I was actually winning. This was so much fun! The feeling of getting the winning email was exhilarating.

I went on to win 47 things by 6/21/15. The majority of my winnings (32) were from blogs. Out of those winnings 28 were from the premium subscription to online-sweepstakes.com that I would not have seen if I had not been a member.  Most of the rest were from book clubs or authors. Some were small and some were pretty nice like a Britax Car Seat and a Makita Air Compressor. A few gift cards actually took care of birthday presents for my granddaughters. I loved entering giveaways.

I stopped entering giveaways in May of 2015 but continued to win a few things I had entered up until 6/22/15. I started a giveaway blog thinking I could have the best of both worlds. After all, wouldn’t it be like I won every giveaway if I got to try out all of the products and host a giveaway for them so someone else could win? And if I couldn’t pay my bills for the blog I could just sell some of the loot. Um, it doesn’t work that way in real life but more about that in a later post.

So my message would be that giveaways are a great way to try out new products and sometimes cover the expense of birthdays or Christmas. They actually can help to supplement your income when the prize is one you would have had to purchase anyway or if the prize is a gift card.

I wouldn’t count on giveaways if I needed the money to feed my family but if you have the time giveaways really can help with non-urgent needs. I think that at the least most of the time the can help you take of gift giving. But you have to be careful not to count on anything at all. It is all luck and you cannot expect to win or even get upset when you don’t. That is the way things work.

Not only do giveaways give people a chance to try new products but many times that winner becomes a lifelong user of that product (if the product proves itself to be better than the rest). Sponsors are using giveaways to promote their products more and more today because it works!

So how much time do you have to invest to win at giveaways? While there is no guarantee of winning at all, I was spending 4-5 hours a day entering giveaways. The bottom line is that I made about $2.77 per hour entering giveaways.

Sure, some people do better but the majority probably do similar. So can you really call it a job? I have done plenty of work at home jobs that paid only between $3-5 per hour. The one thing I can say is that I actually enjoyed entering giveaways.

If you have the time and you do not have to depend on the income then entering giveaways can be a great way to supplement if not your income than the little extras that you might not be able to afford otherwise. .I would never had even tried a Kindle if it hadn’t been for winning one and now I am hooked. I will likely never be without one again so whether the sponsor realizes it or not that was a successful giveaway because I became a lifelong customer. Not only that but I went on to blog about my win which gave them free advertising. One word of caution, stay away from sites that automatically enter you into sweepstakes. They are not worth the money, may be against the rules, and the sweepstakes they enter you in usually have such a huge number of entries that your chance of winning is about as much as winning the lottery.

Have you ever tried entering giveaways? What is your experience? Are you doing better than I did or about the same? Do you love it?