Frequently Asked Questions

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What is Rafflecopter?

Rafflecopter makes running online giveaways crazy-simple. Rafflecopter allows you to customize and embed an entry form on your site that incentivizes your audience to perform tasks in exchange for entries into a sweepstakes. Customize your widget and place it anywhere HTML is accepted, whether it’s on your Wordpress blog or your Facebook page. Provide the promotion details, plug in the prize, and you’re off and collecting entries. Build your email lists on MailChimp, ConstantContact, and AWeber. Grow your audience across all your social networks, including Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest. When your promotion ends, Rafflecopter gives you the tools that makes selecting and announcing a winner a piece of cake. Download all your entries and giveaway history into a spreadsheet with a single click.

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What kind of promotions can I run with Rafflecopter?

Rafflecopter was created as an easy way to run giveaways or sweepstakes. Sweepstakes are defined as prize giveaways where the winners are chosen at random where no skill is involved (unlike an essay contest, photo/video contest, etc.)

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How much does Rafflecopter cost?

Rafflecopter provides a basic (and awesome!) service free of charge. To make it even awesome-r, premium features are available via a monthly subscription. Check out our pricing page for more info.

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What is Rafflecopter's privacy policy?

We take privacy of our users and their readers very seriously. We will never take the data that's collected and sell it or use it in a malicious way. We'll never email those folks who enter your giveaways set up through the Rafflecopter application. We realize privacy is a concerning issue for bloggers, entrants, and companies alike.We definitely encourage you to read our privacy policy.

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What languages does Rafflecopter support?

Rafflecopter currently supports English. We have plans to branch out into other languages for our international users.

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How can I contact Rafflecopter?

Email is best (support@rafflecopter.com). We're active on Twitter too, as well as Facebook. We'd love it if you'd stop by!

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Where can I install Rafflecopter?

Rafflecopter works wherever HTML is accepted. Paste the Rafflecopter widget code in the location you’d like the entry form to appear :)

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I can't see my Rafflecopter widget on WordPress!

If you're having trouble seeing your Rafflecopter widget on your WordPress blog, follow these five steps:

1. When adding your giveaway to your post, make sure that the Rafflecopter widget code is placed in the ‘HTML’ editor, not the ‘visual’ editor.
2. If you're trying to view the widget in 'preview' mode, you’ll have to refresh the preview page twice. Much like when you embed a YouTube video, the Rafflecopter widget doesn’t appear in preview mode the first time you view the preview page. When you paste the Rafflecopter widget in the HTML tab, don't expect to see the widget when you switch over to the 'visual' tab.
3. If you host your blog with Wordpress.com for free, one of their limitations is they won't let you post javascript code (including the Rafflecopter widget code) unless you're hosting elsewhere. Learn more about this on Wordpress.com's support page.
4. Your WordPress user role must be set at an 'admin' or an 'editor' level for you to post unfiltered HTML, which includes the Rafflecopter widget. Admins can view and change user roles in your WordPress dashboard under 'Users'.
5. If your widget still doesn't appear, go to the post where you're trying to paste the widget. Delete the code, and save the post. Then, sign into your Rafflecopter account, go to the giveaway you're running, and copy and paste the widget code directly into the ‘HTML’ tab again and immediately publish the post.

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I can't see my Rafflecopter widget on Blogger!

If you're having trouble seeing your Rafflecopter widget on Blogger, simply follow these five steps:

1. When adding your giveaway to your post, make sure that the Rafflecopter widget code is placed in the ‘Edit HTML’ editor, not the ‘Compose’ editor.
2. Check to see that you have the updated editor of blogger. If you have the ‘old editor’, you won’t be able to see Rafflecopter widgets appear. Here’s a blog post that describes how to do this.
3. If you’re using blogger’s ‘dynamic view’, this setting unfortunately doesn’t allow users to post HTML/javascript. Here’s a blog post that details this issue and other downsides of blogger’s ‘dyanmic view’.
4. If your widget doesn't appear still, go to the post where you're trying to paste the widget. Delete the code, and save the post. Then, sign into your Rafflecopter account, go to the giveaway you're running, and copy and paste the widget code directly into the ‘Edit HTML’ tab again and immediately publish the post.

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How do I create a custom entry option?

With Rafflecopter, it's possible to create a custom entry option by using the 'Invent Your Own Option!' entry option. On the edit page in your Rafflecopter dashboard, select the entry option 'Invent Your Own Option!', rename the title of the entry and add detailed directions for your entrants. If you're having folks enter a custom entry options, ask them to leave a bit of information so you're able to verify their entry when the giveaway is over. You can do that by clicking on the button that asks them for additional information. For further reading, here's a blog post that outlines this process in more detail.

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How do I add a hyperlink in my entry option?

You can spice up Rafflecopter entries, including adding links, using wiki-style formatting. In order to add a link in your Rafflecopter giveaway, you'd put something like this in the directions: [Your Website](http://www.yourwebsite.com) This would link to www.yourwebsite.com w/ the anchor text 'Your Website'. For further reading, here's a blog post that outlines this process in more detail.

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How does Rafflecopter choose winners for my giveaways?

Rafflecopter doesn't automatically choose and announce winners for you. When a giveaway is over, Rafflecopter gives you the tools that make it easy to randomly select a number of winners, help you verify the winners' entries, and announce the winners inside the widget. Check out our blog post that describes the *most efficient way possible* to moderate entrants and choose winners for your giveaways.

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Can my giveaways have multiple winners?

Yes, your giveaways can have as many winners as you'd like. When the giveaway is over, simply add the number of winners you'd like.

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Can I run a Facebook giveaway using Rafflecopter?

Yup! The Rafflecopter Facebook app allows you to easily set up and run giveaways on your Facebook page in the matter of minutes. Here's a blog post that describes our Facebook giveaway app in more detail.

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I'm trying to install a giveaway on Facebook but it keeps saying I don't have any Facebook pages!

Here's what probably happened: when you click the 'Install to Facebook Page' button in your Rafflecopter dashboard, a pop up window appears asking you to ‘Log in w/ Facebook’. Once clicked, you’ll be taken to a Facebook window called “Rafflecopter Tab”. Click “Log In with Facebook”, and then you must give the “Rafflecopter Tab” permission to manage your pages by clicking “Allow”. However, if you click "Skip" instead of "Allow" button, the next page's drop down box won't have any of your FB pages listed. In order for your pages to appear, you must allow the Rafflecopter app to communicate with your Facebook page. If this sounds like what happened, here's how you can fix it: log into your Facebook and go to your 'account settings'. On the left side of the page, click on 'Apps', and on the next page, find the app "Rafflecopter Tab" and remove it. Return to your Rafflecopter dashboard, click “Log In with Facebook”, and make sure you give the “Rafflecopter Tab” permission to manage your pages by clicking “Allow”.

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Is Rafflecopter's Facebook app mobile compatible?

Yup! But you must share a certain link in your status update to work properly. You can find this link on the top of your Rafflecopter Facebook app page tab.

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Is my giveaway promotion on Facebook legal?

Rafflecopter is compliant with Facebook promotion guidelines and platform policies. But just like how you can break the law with a bad attitude and a sack of potatoes, it's possible to break the Facebook promotion guidelines with Rafflecopter. That's why we've written an in-depth blog post on Facebook promotion guidelines and how they pertain to Rafflecopter to keep you out of trouble.

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Can I run a Rafflecopter giveaway on my Facebook wall?

Nope. When you run a giveaway on Facebook, to abide by Facebook promotional guidelines, you must run the giveaway on a canvas page or a page tab, which is where Rafflecopter giveaways will appear. Here's a blog post that describes Facebook promotion guidelines and how they pertain to Rafflecopter.

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How do I remove the Rafflecopter page tab from my page?

If you go up to your Facebook page and go to your page tabs on your FB timeline, you should be able to click the drop down arrow on the right, hover over the Rafflecopter page tab image, and select 'uninstall'.

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Where can I learn about the premium features?

Rafflecopter has a different feature set in each account level. You can check out the different features on our pricing page.

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How does Rafflecopter charge monthly?

When you sign up for a premium subscription, your credit card information will be stored off-site, encrypted, and protected. Your account will be set to recurring billing on a monthly basis at the price of the package you signed up for unless you decide to stop your monthly subscription.

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What is Rafflecopter's refund policy?

You can read about our refund policy on our terms & conditions page here.

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Why is the MailChimp list that I need not listed in the dropdown box?

MailChimp enables users to create custom sign-up forms with custom required fields. Rafflecopter can only support required fields that it recognizes. These include email ("EMAIL"), first name ("FNAME") and last name ("LNAME"). Because Rafflecopter already has this information for each entrant, the entrant is not required to enter any additional information which leads to better conversion. If one of your lists is missing from the dropdown and you'd like it to appear, please uncheck "Required Field" on any custom fields in the MailChimp form creator.

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How do I enter Rafflecopter giveaways?

Each Rafflecopter giveaway is set up and customized differently by the giveaway's admin. With that in mind, here's an infographic that describes the Rafflecopter widget and a demo video that describes how to enter Rafflecopter giveaways.

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What's the difference between signing in with Facebook vs Name/Email combo?

Some folks prefer connecting through Facebook, others prefer name and email. Here's a blog post that describes the differences between the two.

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I'm having trouble logging into the widget via Facebook!

Sometimes there are issues on Facebook's end that cause this. Usually clearing your browser cookies and cache help the issue. Before going any further, here's a page that describes how to do this depending on what browser you use. If that doesn't help, try another browser.

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How do I know if I win a giveaway?

All giveaway admins are encouraged to send an email to those who have been chosen as winners for their giveaways at the email address the entrant left during the promotion. The admin will contact you through the email address that you entered with. As an entrant, you can email the giveaway admin when the promotion is over or keep an eye on the widget for when they announce the winner's name on the widget.

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Help - I haven't received my prize!

While we provide the software that allows folks to run giveaways on their blogs and Facebook pages, we're not responsible for the fulfillment of all the prizes that are run through Rafflecopter. Our best recommendation would be to keep in close touch with the giveaway admin.

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How does the 'Refer-a-Friend' feature work?

If you check the “Enable Refer-A-Friend (aka. “viral sharing”)” button when creating a giveaway, here’s what will happen: After one of your entry options has been completed, a box will appear that will give each entrant a unique URL that they can share with their friends. For each friend that enters the giveaway, the referring individual will receive +1 entry into the giveaway. Each entrant can refer up to 10 people.

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