Meet Our Latest Winners!

A facebook prize draw landed me a Shepherd Neame - Spitfire "Keep Calm & Celebrate" T-shirt (As Pictured).

I then noticed I was a finalist in a Caption competition from Pitman Training on facebook...then checked my facebook "other" mail and wow! I won & pocketed me a nice £250!

I have been entering competitions for about 4 weeks, determined to win after giving the hobby up many years ago! In this space of time, I have entered about 500 online competitions! I was starting to lose patience with it, and, finding it quite time consuming, was considering giving up again, thinking I would never reap the rewards for all my hard work. Then, just last week,I noticed an email addressed "Congratulations,In Style Winner". It turns out I had been selected to win a complete set of Bumble and Bumble hair products through an Instyle Magazine prize draw I discovered by coming through The Prize Finder website! It arrived today and I couldnt be happier! It would be a small win to most people but I am over the moon! A win is a win and it has made me even more determined to win some more! I am no longer considering giving up with my new found motivation and the "Closing Soon" section is a great way of helping me to fit a couple of most wanted prizes in as they close! Thanks The Prize Finder, bring on some more wins!

I thought I would have a change and try and do more competitions on twitter. They are so easy to do and I don't seem to get distracted like I do on Facebook with people popping up in chat.
One of my first wins was a £10 Nando's card - very handy as both my sons go there all the time. I try to tweet first thing before work, at lunch if my connection is okay and in the evening. I seem to have 2 small wins on twitter a week. I notice a lot of the companies seem to do spontaneous competitions that run for just an hour and you just need to RT and RT. All you need to do is follow the company and usually tweet their tweet. Sometimes they make it a bit more interesting and ask for an answer to something.
Go on have a go tweet tweet.

What a good month May has been for me (so far) , not necessarily with the weather but with competitions which for me is even better!

Got such a surprise today when a special delivery man came to my door this morning with £100 from Walkers. It really cheered me up since I'm a student so every little helps! I will use the money to put towards a new Desktop PC. I never thought you could win from text competitions but I'm the proof that you can!

Also I won some American style print shorts which are pretty funky, will be wearing those soon!

Late last year I won a photography competition with Oliver Bonas, who wanted an instagram/vintage style image to use on the packaging of a new jewellery range. My photograph was of some peacock feathers that sit on my desk- and I was delighted when they sent me £50 to spend in their store. I bought some lovely Christmas presents, and a gorgeous mixing bowl for myself. Earlier this month I had a surprise package through the door - it was a lovely necklace with my initial 'L' on it, with the peacock packaging. I thought it was really nice added touch, and it made me super proud to know they're being sold across the country! I might even put it on my CV!

I have been comping on and off for a couple of years and have won lots of different prizes, however in 2012 I have won some prizes that really could be classed as “life-changing” and have had consequences that have extended far beyond the original prize.

In January I won an Apple MacBook Air in a video competition run by BUPA where you had to say what “healthy means to me.” As I thought this was going to be part of an ongoing advertising campaign, it caused me to really focus on my health and to attack my health and weight goals with renewed vigour.

This had the effect of losing more weight, so that when I won some gorgeous ski wear from Eider clothing, I was able to wear a smaller size than I usually would and to have the confidence to wear snug-fitting clothes.

The MacBook is now being used by my techie husband to develop Apps, which could lead to a whole new business and stream of income for us.

My next health related prize was a pair of Zaggora Hotpants, which are designed to enhance a workout and so increase fat burning and weight loss. From that I have discovered a renewed interest in writing on my blog.

The most recent win was a ticket to Cybher, which is a sold-out conference about blogging presented by successful women bloggers. A couple of the speakers are talking about how to make money from blogs and how to turn my blog into a book, which is another potential avenue for another very enjoyable and potentially profitable source of income.

Those four prizes have already changed my life and who knows where that might lead me! I will also get to meet Di Coke in person at Cybher.

I love winning tickets to anything in London because most things are so expense these days. I won a family ticket to Madame Tussauds online and we had such a laugh in there. Fancy singing with Freddie Mercury or playing the drums with the Beetles, seeing William and Kate or walking on the moon. Its all here. As I blog about London its all usefull stuff to write about too.
My next win was three bottles of wine as a runner up prize in the recent Black Tower Comp. In this comp you had to write about what your perfect day would be with £10,000. First prize was whatever you had chosen worth £10,000. Maybe next time I will get first prize, you never know with comping.
Then I got an email about a review I had written this won me a VIP Ferry Crossing to France for a car and four people. This is worth over £150.00 so a good win.
If you haven`t won anything yet just keep entering and following all the advice on prizefinder.

I thought I would give comping a go as I have been home for a few months unwell and have had an operation. Last week I started in earnest and entered quite a few. I entered one small competition for some sherbert straws and won it and then I entered a Facebook competition for some Peppa Pig toys and won that too! They left a comment on their page that I then read saying I had won! Very easy to miss! But I am delighted that in less than a week of trying I have had two little wins!

In February I saw a lovely lady on the breakfast news who seemed to have won practically everything under the sun. That is how Di Coke got me into the world of comping. I seriously comped for the whole of March to see if I had got the Di-factor. So far, I got many freebies and prizes. I won around £100 worth of cinema vouchers. A biggie was a 100ml bottle of the latest Hugo Boss perfume which I won just in time for my wedding anniversary. But by far, the greatest prize was my garden photo being selected as the top 4 in Inamo tablecloth comp. The winner is not yet announced but I have already got my reward knowing that my talent was appreciated by a panel of judges and they compared my work to that of a ‘still from a BBC wildlife epic’! So here are some things I learned along the way:
1 – Play instant win comps to get instant but small prizes. They will keep your spirits up.
2 – Register with useful comping websites like ThePrizeFinder and CompersNews to get into obscure comps.
3 – Greater effort, greater rewards. For those wondering how Di manages to get all the big wins, I suggest please look at her entries and observe the tremendous amount of effort and creativity behind them.
4 – Do a cost-benefit analysis. I comped for a month and kept an account of how much I had won; believe me, it was worth my monthly mortgage!
5 – Be fair and honest while you comp. Cheating can make you a fortune, but then so can drug dealing! Have a conscience!
6 – Look at comping as something to explore your creative talents. Who knows, it could lead to a career change and a promising future!

I have been entering competitions on ThePrizeFinder for over a year and up until recently have not won anything.
I'm happy to say that I have now joined the winners circle and have just received a lovely pair of trousers worth £260 through a Stylist competition.
I am over the moon just to have won something and to top it off the trousers fit perfectly.
This will spur me on to keep comping as I was starting to doubt if I'd ever win!