How Long does it take to Win Something?

The Background Story

A little over a week ago, we received an email from a reader, who was getting frustrated from her lack of winning any contests. Our friendly reader stated she entered draws for approximately one hour a day. She was also wondering why it appeared that others would enter and win more often, than her (who had won nothing yet). We hope that she will find the answers in this article, and that it will be helpful to anyone who is struggling to get their first win.

Appearances Can be Deceiving

How long will it take before I win something? To answer this question for our reader we would need all the facts. Unfortunately, we do not have all the facts. We have only some of her facts. She enters 0ne hour daily. She has not won yet. She uses Roboform. These are all the facts we know. We do not know the facts on the others who are entering. We don’t know how long they have been entering. We don’t know how many accounts they are using. We don’t know if they are playing instant win games or UPC code games. However, we can use a hypothesis model to explain this.

We can assume that the other entrants are playing for 3-4 hours per day and we can assume that they are entering every random draw that occurs that they have encountered and entering more than a few voting contests. If this is the case, the odds statistically will go up for them. As 3 hours of entering contests will create a 66% chance more of winning than that of her 1 hour competitor. A person who has stayed on for 4 hours has a 75% percent chance of winning more than her 1 hour competitor. And as each day passes the odds go up in favor of the person who spends more time on than that of a one hour person. Essentially, it all boils down to statistics and the more you are in, the better chance you have of winning.

What if I am Using a Roboform Method of Entry

Using a Roboform method of entry does create a difference, but some contests do not allow the use of these and their programs are designed to circumvent the use of them. I myself, do not use Roboform. I simply use the autofill option on Googlechrome which is essentially the same as Roboform. Again, some programs are designed to prevent this and in some cases I still have to enter the information. It does save time and it does allow one to enter more than a person who types in the information in every form. You can estimate that a person using Roboform or other autofill program could enter twice as many as those who type everything in.

The Appearance of a Contester Winning may be an Illusion

Sometimes it may appear that some contesters can enter a draw and win! Most of the time this is luck and since a lot of results are random, it only appears that they are winning frequently. If the person enters a lot of voting contests aside from randoms, these make a huge statistical anomaly since that person may be more suited for voting contests and may have a huge influence with a voting crowd. It only makes sense then that the illusion of them winning would be portrayed. Again, it is based on the amount of entries that one person has.

Having friends who seemingly enter every contests, I sometimes see 2 or 3 wins in a row from some friends. Does it make me a little jealous? I’d be lying if it didn’t but I am happy for them and I myself shy away from a lot of voting contests simply for the fact that it is and does require a lot of hard effort and work. Randoms are easier, but the competition to winning them takes a lot of patience where wins are fewer and farther between.

The Time it Takes to Win

Another factor which needs to be taken into account is the time it has taken to win contests. Since we don’t know the facts, let’s assume that our reader spends 1 hour a day on the computer for a year. Her competitor spends 3 hours a day on the computer. Now given this information, our reader would have to do 3 years of contest entries where her competitor has done it in the same time frame. Given this time, it is highly likely that the competitor is going to see wins more often than that of our reader. Again this is only hypothetical and again we assume that the draw is random.

Multiple Accounts

There is also a need to mention which comes up quite consistently is that many people on Facebook who contest have more than one account. These accounts are usually a relative such as a husband/wife/soon/daughter, etc. The primary contester may use more than one of these accounts when the draw is a random, or an instant win. Morally some may see this as being wrong and I think Amy addressed this issue in her latest blog on Contestmob, Entering Sweeps for Others. Regardless of how we view it, the bottom line is that using more than one account over someone who uses one account will triple or quadruple their statistical odds at winning. It may not seem fair, but this is the general trend on Facebook in relation to contesters.

Things you Can Do

1. Read ContestMob articles on the topic of Odds of Winning. You will find a lot of helpful tips there, on how to increase your odds.

2. Try different types of contests – for example, if you have been entering only fill-the-form contests, try some that require creative skills, like a video contest. Those have much better odds of winning. Also try Facebook, Twitter, Blogs, Instant Wins. There are many options for you to try out! Some of these options will be better suited for you personally than others, and you will discover your favorite contest categories.

3. Make sure you read your email messages carefully, as sometimes the winning notifications are subtly hidden in newsletter looking emails, or end up in spam. Use these suggestions to manage your email. Here’s a great article on how to manage spam.

4. Just keep entering, and don’t give up yet! Keep at it for at least 2 more months – by then you will surely start seeing some wins!

Whichever Way you Choose to Go

Whichever way you choose in your passion for contest entries we hope that you just enjoy your time and keep entering since that is the only way to win. We also hope that we have answered your question and that you’ll find our information useful and reliable. thanks for reading ContestMob. If you have any further questions, we would love to answer them for any reader.

About the Author, truckerofbc

Roger, also known in the contesting world as truckerofbc, is a professional transport driver who in his spare time is an avid and daily contester and coupon user. Living in New Westminster, BC, Roger is married with 2 children.

Christine Fretwell

I enter mostly blog contest. The one advantage to many of these is that I can usually see how many other entries there are decide if I want to come back to complete the daily tasks. If a contest is ‘good’ and has 100 or less entries, its well worth my while to come back daily. If it has over 2000 entries, I’ll proabably do a few entries and move on.
Of course, high odds doesn’t mean a win. I was in one blog contest where 2 people entered. I lost. Sigh.
truckerofbc

Been there and done that. I too have entered many contests where I thought for sure I was going to win and then I would receive the email, we regret to inform you, you did not win. But it is always a nice surprise when you see the word “congratulations”.
DreamFog

I enter contests pretty much all day long. I probably spend a total of 4-6 hours on them daily. I enter about 50 daily contests–and intend on increasing that number to 150 but I always get sidetracked by facebook and twitter, lol. Oh yeah and blogs. Twitter parties are my favorite, because they are like instant win games and you get that right now gratification. I don’t use my hubby’s facebook or my kids’ facebook to enter any contests. I will pick up the phone and call my mom and/or my sisters and tell them to enter one if the odds look good and the prize is good. I did get into a contest that needed votes once and I did have the hubby and kids vote. My dtr would get so mad because I would actually make her do it and not do it for her because I felt like that would be cheating
Blogs are great because like, Christine F. said, the total entries are right there and if there are 2000 entries and you can possible do 20 entries then you should do them all and your odds go up. They are time consuming though. I try to enter 2-3 blog contests a day that I know I would really like to win.
As far as the daily contests-the really big prizes, I haven’t had that win yet. But I’ve won prizes from Softlips lipbalms to an ipod touch and many in between.
Good luck to you and your letter writer. Remember to just enter as much as you can, you’re odds will go up with every entry.
- truckerofbc
  
  Thanks for your input DreamFog. It is certainly appreciated. I spend 4 to 6 hours on the computer myself and the results are well displayed in my pictures on Facebook on just some of my wins! I know this is a little too much time for some, but the name of the game in reality is all about statistics. The more entries you get in the better. Those twitter parties sound good though Thanks for reading.