How to enter Gleam giveaways

If you enter a lot of online comps, you’ll probably have encountered Gleam widgets. They’re used on blogs, websites and Facebook pages and, like Rafflecopter, are an easy way for a promoter to run a fair and random prize draw. 

Gleam giveaways have one or more entry tasks, which can be mandatory or optional. When the giveaway has ended, Gleam chooses a random winner from all entries, and the promoter contacts the winner via email and can choose to display the winner’s name and photo on the widget.

Gleam giveaways are much quicker to enter than Rafflecopter, as tasks like tweeting can be done with a single click, rather than copying and pasting links. Although this makes life easier for the entrant, it does make it harder for the promoter to check entries have been completed, and that’s why bloggers who like to run multiple task giveaways usually opt for Rafflecopter rather than Gleam. Personally, as both a comper and a promoter, I prefer the look and feel of Gleam.

In this post I’ll be showing how to enter a Gleam giveaway correctly. For most giveaways, you don’t have to complete every task to enter the prize draw, and you don’t require any social media accounts – using just your email address is fine. Before you start entering Gleam giveaways, consider creating a Google/gmail account – then it’s easy to comment on blogs, YouTube and Google+ if those are required tasks.

Some bloggers will list a LOT of optional tasks in their Gleam widget, but just complete the ones you want to. Each one will get you the corresponding number of entries in the draw.

Gleam giveaway walkthrough

I’m going to use one of Lucy’s giveaways as an example to show the Gleam entry process – the video below will show exactly what I’m doing at each stage.

Below is the ‘widget’ on the blog – this is what you’ll see if you’re NOT logged in.

At the bottom, click ‘Terms and Conditions’ to see more information (this may be blank!) – you should also check any instructions within the blog post to confirm what you need to do. On the widget you can also see the prize, how long is left and the number of entries you have in the draw – the promoter can choose to show or hide the total number of entries.

The promoter can choose from various log in methods, which are usually email, Facebook and Twitter (Instagram and Soundcloud are optional). Sometimes you might be asked to complete name, email address, postal address and date of birth – but usually a Facebook login is sufficient! If you click to connect with a social media account you’ll have to give Gleam permission to access your account – once you’ve done this, you’ll automatically be logged in to Gleam next time you use it. When you log in, you can see the tasks you need to complete.

For this particular giveaway there are 2 tasks that when completed, will unlock 8 more tasks. Although these top 2 tasks are referred to as ‘mandatory’, in fact even if you complete just one of them, you will still be in the prize draw – but you won’t have access to any of the bonus optional tasks. Completing the mandatory tasks reveals the bonus tasks.

The total number of available entries is shown at the top of the widget – in this case, I can get 14 entries in total if I do all mandatory AND optional tasks (it’s 14 entries because one of the tasks is worth 5 entries, and the other nine are worth 1 entry each).

Here are the tasks I need to complete to enter this prize draw:

Follow on Twitter

Click the +1 to automatically follow the specified Twitter account. If you’re new to Gleam you’ll have to allow the app access to your Twitter account first.

Visit a page on Facebook

Click +1, then follow the link to visit the Facebook page (you’re not obliged to Like it), close the window and click Continue.

Completing both the mandatory tasks will show your 2 entries at the top of the widget and display a list of all the optional tasks you can complete, in the case of this giveaway we have 8 more tasks. You can see that one of them ‘Click for a daily bonus entry’ has a ‘lock’ next to it – the promoter has set the options so this task is only unlocked if the entrant completes a certain number of other tasks.

Click here to confirm your entry

This task is simply a bonus entry for completing the two mandatory tasks – clicking +1 gets you another entry in the draw.

Comment on this blog post

If the widget is on a blog, leaving a comment is likely to be a task. Click on the +1 button in the widget to see what your comment should be about – a lot of entrants mess up here and leave a comment to say ‘I love this prize!’ instead of answering the question. Scroll down to leave a comment, THEN click Continue in the widget! Blogs have different commenting methods – you can read more about these on my Rafflecopter guide.

Click for a daily bonus entry

There may be a ‘free entry’ option, where you simply click for a bonus entry and can usually do so daily.

Subscribe to a newsletter

Click the button to join the mailing list. For some Gleam widgets, a click on +1 may be automatically set up to add you to a list from a provider such as Mailchimp. For this particular giveaway, I simply type my email address into the box.

Visit on Instagram

Click +1 to visit an Instagram page – you don’t have to follow it (Instagram used to allow Gleam to follow directly from widgets, but this is no longer available).

Tweet on Twitter

Tweeting is much easier than Rafflecopter – hover over the word TWEET to check the text before you send it, then simply click +1.

I’ve now completed all 14 entries for Lucy’s giveaway – when I return to do the daily bonus entry, here’s what the widget looks like, with +1 per day:

My number of entries at the top of the widget will increase by one for each day I click the bonus button. That could get me 40 total entries in the draw if I enter daily for the remaining 26 days.

Other Gleam tasks you might encounter:

Retweet on Twitter

Similar to tweeting – hover over Retweet to see the tweet text you’ll be sending.

Answer a question

Answer a question in the Gleam widget, rather than as a comment. This is useful if promoters don’t want entrants copying the answers from the comment thread.

Bonus entry for YouTube subscribers

Click Subscribe Here to open up the promoter’s YouTube page, make sure you’re signed in (with Google) and choose Subscribe. Then click Continue on the Gleam widget.

Add to Google+ circles

Click the +1 button in the widget to add the page to your circles.

Visit on Pinterest

Click the +1 button in the widget to visit the user’s Pinterest profile – you don’t have to follow.

Watch a video

A video will play in the widget. You’ll have to watch the video to the end before you can click to get the entry!

Refer friends for extra entries

With this common option, you’ll be given a unique link which you can choose to share on social media, or just copy and paste into emails. If a friend clicks the link and goes on to enter the giveaway, you’ll get a bonus entry in the draw. You can share this link as often as you like.

There are plenty of other options – the promoter can customise the widget to add anything they like! If there are tasks you’re not sure about, just give them a miss.

• The promoter can add a daily option to many tasks, including tweeting or commenting. If you want to increase your chance of winning, add the URL of the giveaway to a daily bookmarks list and pop back daily for bonus entries.
• Promoters are able to set an age limit for a Gleam giveaway – if this is enabled, you will have to put in your date of birth before entry.
• With Gleam, the default setting is to send an annoying email to entrants confirming their entries in the draw – although promoters can switch this setting off!

Choosing the winner and moderating entries

When the giveaway has ended, the promoter logs in at www.gleam.io and clicks to generate a random winner. The winning entry will be a single task – for example, it could be a YouTube channel subscribe or a tweet. The promoter should check that specific winning task was done correctly – but should also check any other mandatory tasks completed by that person. For example, the winning entry might be a tweet, but if the entrant didn’t also leave a mandatory blog comment, they wouldn’t be eligible to win. If the winner DIDN’T enter correctly, the promoter should invalidate that winning entry, then click again to choose a new winner and do the same checks. This is tricky if the promoter uses the free version of Gleam, as they only have access to the winning entry. My recommendation for promoters on the free Gleam plan is to set all tasks to optional – or have a single, easy to check mandatory task like a blog comment (and the remainder as optional tasks).

When a winning entry has been validated, the promoter clicks to send an email – if you used Facebook log in, this will go to your Facebook-registered address. They can choose to display the winner’s name on the Gleam widget – this will usually be done AFTER the winner has responded to the winning email (for example, if the winner replies to the winning email with a postal address from an ineligible country, a new winner should be drawn).

Changing your linked accounts

One of the problems with Gleam is that users can’t change a linked Twitter or Instagram account, but you can do it by emailing hello@gleam.io. For verification, make sure you email from the address you use to sign in to Gleam (hover over the envelope icon on a widget to see what this is) – then let them know the usernames you want to update!

Visit my Blog Comp Linkys for practice with Gleam giveaways.

Bloggers – if you notice entrants aren’t completing their entries correctly, why not add in some simple instructions telling them which tasks are mandatory, and link them to this post? It will benefit both of you if they take the time to enter your giveaway properly! If you’re interested in using Gleam for a promotion, read my guide How to run Gleam giveaways.

See also: How to enter a Rafflecopter giveaway