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Do you Charge for your Giveaways?

I have been thinking about this a lot lately too. I currently don't charge anything to do a giveaway. For some smaller giveaway items, I will have the company send me the product to review in addition to the giveaway and then have them ship the winner the item when the giveaway is over so I don't have to deal with shipping.

But the amount of work that goes into a giveaway can be crazy! I recently had a Giveaway Bash. It took hours of posting, gathering info, emailing back & forth with sponsors, and then promoting - LOTS of promoting, submitting, etc. I am not sure if it is protocol to charge something. How are you all doing it? How about if they are not going to send me the specific product to review then there will be a certain charge? I am still working it out. The problem is, I sometimes have very large giveaway prizes and I can't expect them to send that to me.

I would love to hear how some of you are handling your giveaway & sponsoring. I am fairly new to giveaways within the past few months. But now that I am offering giveaways, people are contacting me left & right. I am just not sure if I have the time to put into it without being compensated. What are your thoughts?

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Permalink Reply by Dawn Papandrea-Khan on March 4, 2009 at 8:01pm

I really like the fact that you are honest!

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Permalink Reply by The American Homemaker on March 6, 2009 at 1:01am

I have to say, I find this conversation interesting. I would've never even thought that people would charge for a giveaway. Hhmmm I don't have an opinion either way, just a new concept for me.

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Permalink Reply by Dawn Papandrea-Khan on March 6, 2009 at 12:46pm

I have actually decided to limit my giveaways to 1 per week. It was just becoming way too much work for me. I am not charging as of now, especially if the company sends a complimentary sample to review. But I am now offering to Vlog about the product within the review / giveaway for a fee. It is working out well actually.

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Permalink Reply by Melinda on March 16, 2009 at 1:47pm

I would never charge for a giveaway. I choose who I work with (sponsors) and I require them to send the winning prize. I do this blog for fun not for profit.

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Permalink Reply by Sue on May 17, 2009 at 7:45am

Charging a fee would probably bring you less products to review or no products to review. I have never been charged a fee for a product review. People are just so happy to receive my products that it is not necessary to have to pay. The cost of shipping it and the cost of the products is expensive enough as it is

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Permalink Reply by AllThatsFab.com on May 18, 2009 at 12:01pm

If its something that I feel my readers can really use and would enjoy, we don't charge. However, if its a stretch, I don't feel its asking to much for a fee to host a giveaway.

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Permalink Reply by Nightowlmama on May 22, 2009 at 6:06pm

Penny Pinching tv did a write up on this very topic you should take a look at her write up or view her tv show she has it on it posted on her blog.

I"m new to blogging so I've not entered the giveaway pr market yet. HOpefully my time will be soon. thanks for asking a great question

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Permalink Reply by Maria@SavingQueen on May 25, 2009 at 10:34pm

The company hosting the giveaway is helping you entice visitors to visit your site and recommend it to their friends, so it is a win, win situation for the blogger and the sponsor. I do feel that the sponsor should pay for shipping.

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Permalink Reply by Samantha @ Mama Notes on June 8, 2009 at 3:46pm

I don't charge for giveaways. I've found that doing giveaways gets more readers/follower/subscribers to my blog. (Although I've only done a couple.) If you do a review AND a giveaway, it's really great because you're getting a free product out of it AND bringing traffic to your blog. Last month I did a cloth diaper review/giveaway and I got a free cloth diaper out of it! A $18 value!

Down the road, I think I will charge for doing JUST a review- but not if they also do a giveaway.

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Permalink Reply by Eve on July 8, 2009 at 12:57am

I charge $25 dollars for a giveaway with no free product for me OR if the product is worth less than $25 I charge, usually, but it depends on the product, if it is one that I KNOW is going to bring a lot of visitors and affiliate sales than I won't charge, even if they do not send me one to review.

As for all the work, I wimped out and pay a VA to submit all my giveaways to linky's - for only $10 a week for one giveaway a week, it is well worth it to me! She rocks!!

Yes, giveaways help traffic, but I have noticed that a lot of that traffic is only there to enter the giveaway, sad but true, but with the right affiliate program it can work in your favor anyway- I did a giveaway for YNAB a few months ago and I made over $300 so far in affiliate sales, I did NOT charge them! LOL

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Permalink Reply by Celeste on July 8, 2009 at 11:06am

I don't charge to host giveaways. I figure that especially during these rough economic times, why should I ask for $ when they are being so generous in giving away an item? Actually, the only form of compensation I get from blogging is the occasional item I receive to review. I don't get $ from ads, sponsorship, etc.

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Permalink Reply by Tamara Laschinsky on July 9, 2009 at 8:47pm

My giveaways are pretty all my own products (or at least the products I sell!) So I do spend some money on the giveaways but I do great traffic and increase business awareness so the qualitative benefits are good. It would depend on how much benefit you receive - if you aren't receiving much traffic, repeat readers or even bonus products yourself, you may want to charge to make it worth your while.