The Grid! (Keeps Cheaters from Prospering)

It’s a rainy afternoon here in Boulder, but we’d like to announce an awesome new Rafflecopter upgrade anyway!  :D

Verifying that your winners’ entries are all valid is one of the most important parts of the giveaway process. No one wants cheaters to prosper. And yet it’s one of the weakest links in the Rafflecopter chain. Besides the “Export to Excel” button, the Moderate Page doesn’t do much to help with the verification process.

We’re working on some things that will hopefully make bogus entries a thing of the past, but for now we’ve made it much, much easier to tell if an entry is valid or not.

…introducing The Grid :)

It may seem like a lot to take in, but it’s easy to get the hang of, and it makes verifying your winners a lot easier!

The Grid in action

Knock ’em Out with a 1-2 Punch

You can analyze your entries however you want, but here’s how we do it. There are 2 main steps to catching a cheater. Let’s say that Mr. Greg Goodson won our giveaway, and we want to find out if he cheated.

Step 1: Search for the Winner – You can search for their name, email, IP address, or any other column. This will filter out any entries that don’t match your search term, leaving only the person in question.

Click for larger

 

Step 2 – Group the Entries – this breaks down the person’s entries in a way that’s easy to figure out at-a-glance.

The Grid in action

Look at that. Those were supposed to be 1-time entries and he entered way more than he should have. Busted!

There’s a lot more you can do by combining your abilities to search, sort, and group the entries. For instance…

  • You can group the winner’s entries by entry option, then use sort to quickly scan and make sure the winner only tweeted once per day
  • You can search the winner’s IP address to see if the entered under multiple names from the same computer.

There’s a lot more you can do with the grid. That’s just the tip of the iceberg. Along with The Grid, we also added the ability for you to add entries manually, which should come in handy!

… in case you missed it, don’t forget that you can now add multiple winners to your giveaways!

UPDATE (BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND)

Your wish is our command. We’ve added back the option to delete entries from The Grid!

Get those entries out of here!

 

— J.R. (@runningskull)

 

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About the author

Juan

Software toolmaker, explorer, & designer. Boulder resident & steep hill afficionado. Co-founder and CEO of Rafflecopter.com

  • I always wonder how others handle winners with the same IP but different names and emails. I hate to disqualify all of them if say it’s a shared location like a library or people who share an internet connection like roommates.

    • Everyone has their own way of verifying and announcing winners. When we run a Rafflecopter giveaway, we don’t moderate any entries until the giveaway is over and we’ve picked a winner. Then we check to see if the winner entered the giveaway correctly. If they did, we award the prize, if not, we judge it on a case by case basis and use our best judgement.

    • ArmyMomsPlace

      I’m not too worried when it comes to the IP thing. I’m guilty of being with a friend and her telling me of awesome Photography contests and hopping onto her computer to enter them. When people say, “well I don’t know how to enter”, or “entering is too much work”, I tend to pull out my lappy and walk them through the process….But that’s me!

    • Jodi Hoppe Wresh

      Yeah, my family members only have a couple computers we share. i have not run into that with giveaways but an acct with a survey site was banned because i took the surveys at the library when my internet was down and apparently there was another user at library taking surveys. the survey site told me that i can only take surveys from the ip i originally signed up with or be banned. sometimes that can be unrealistic in some cases

    • Terri

      Also, keep in mind that people who use proxies (to avoid gov snooping) may have the same IPs as many other people.

  • can you still disqualify an entry and put it back in later? are you able to view the entries in list form or now is it in the chart format?

    • Anonymous

      Good questions, Ferne! For the first one, take a look at my comment above as a response to ArmyMomsPlace.

      For the second, you can no longer view the entries in pure list form (except on the widget itself). Is there something missing with the chart format that you’d like to have back?

      Thanks!

  • One thing I’ve noticed is that sometimes when I enter a giveaway, I’ve accidentally entered again a few days later even though it was supposed to be one time entry.  I hit enter and then remember that I’ve entered already, so it would look like I was trying to cheat even though I didn’t mean to.  Does it let me enter again if I’ve cleared my cookies or something?

    • Yes, if your cookies get cleared, the Rafflecopter form will act as if you haven’t entered the giveaway yet. That said, we’re building a system that will not rely on cookies to track whether you entered or not.

      • Anonymous

        When will that be implimented?  I run into that problem a LOT and it’s very frustrating.  Also today I have the opposite issue – I’m supposed to go out after work, so I was going to do my giveaways on my lunch hour… from my work PC.  Which doesn’t know I entered all these giveaways. So, the only way for it to accept my entry is for me to do the mandatory entry again on each one of these giveaways – and then I run the risk of getting DQ’d. There goes my plan. *pissed*

        • We hope sooner than later. We don’t have an exact date, but we’re aware this is a super important update. We promise we’re working as fast as we can!

  • ArmyMomsPlace

    So how does one delete the extra entries that cheaters are using….I have someone currently with double entries on everything except the mandatory entry!!

    • Anonymous

      We actually took out the ability to delete entries. It caused a few folks some confusion, and we did some research into how people were using the Moderate page and (surprisingly) found *almost no one* deletes entries during the contest (I imagine it takes too much time).

      It’s easier to verify only the potential winner’s entry. If it turned out he/she cheated, you can just pick a different winner. Why verify hundreds of entries (or thousands!?) when you can just verify the winner instead? Both ways ensure a cheater won’t win, but one’s a lot less work, and that’s what we’re all about! :D

      We’re not opposed to deleting entries, though, and could bring it back if there’s enough of a reason. It’s just that almost no one was using the feature. 

      I’d love to hear your thoughts on the pros/cons of it. Thanks for taking the time to respond :)

      • ArmyMomsPlace

        I actually prefer to have the delete option, because I do have readers that enter into my giveaways and will count all entries when the winner (and number) are announced to make sure that I have counted correctly. I also get emails (6 today) informing me that there are multiple entries done by a single person for a single entry! LOL!

        I also have a lot of “new to giveaway” readers who are entering, and mess up entries,  I need to be able to delete those entries as well.

        Guess I’ll have to just Export at the end of the day and do it there for the time being.

        • ArmyMomsPlace

          Here you go….good example of cheating and I need to be able to delete ALL entries…….Mandatory entry, she claims she has done – NOPE!  All the other entries……she claims she had done….NOPE!!

          NEED THOSE GONE!

          • Anonymous

            Those are really good reasons for having the ability to delete. I can picture some angry contest enterers furious about people getting counted more than once :)

            We’ll do some more re-evaluation in the next few days, and very well may put it back in. If so, it’ll be easier than before to delete multiple entries at once (where you had to delete each one individually).

            Thanks so much for the feedback, we really appreciate you taking the time to let us know what you think. Since you did (and made some very good arguments), you’ll probably get your wish! :D

          • LDerrick

            I too would like to have the ability to delete comments. I m currently holding my second giveaway with rafflecopeter and we hae over 2000 entries in the first 24 hours of a week long giveaway. When I look at the grid I see that one person did the same entry 5 times! I would like to be able to delete 4 of those and allow the randomness of the selecter to work its magic:)

          • Rachel R.

            I’m glad that you are considering giving us back the delete option.  I think it’s an important part of being able to moderate the giveaways and keep things fair.

          • Shana

            Please tell me you are putting the delete button back in.  I need to be able to delete those people who entered the giveaway more than once in order to “tweet everyday”.  It would be unfair for those people to enter into the contest more than once.  Thanks!

      • My main reason for wanting the ability to delete entries is because very often, people can accidentally make a mistake and enter information more than once. People are only human, after all, and if I have a reader that has always followed all the rules before and then has, say, two tweets on the same day, I know that it’s most likely just an accidental oversite. If I drew their name, I would want to delete the extra entry and then redraw the winner. I wouldn’t want to necessarily exclude the reader from the entire draw because of one little mistake. The chance of them winning on the redraw may be slim, but I still feel they deserve that chance.

      • Rachel R.

        I would really like the ability to delete.  An entrant informed that it doesn’t recognize that she’s already entered, so she’s completing the mandatory entry every day to unlock the daily entries.  I thought I could just delete the extra mandatory entries that she’s done but apparently I cannot.

        I know I can just verify the winner, but this is allowing people to have way more entries than they should, even though they are not cheating, it’s a glitch on Rafflecopter’s side with the cookies.  If they have more entries, even if they are not all legitimate entries, then they have better (unfair) odds of being selected as the winner. 

        If I could delete entries, I could just delete the unintended extras and even up the odds again.  Do you see my dilemma?

  • Shannon Miller

    Is there a way to tell if the entrants did all the required steps in order to enter? I have over 3800 entries on the giveaway but only 3300 on my page and all entrants were supposed to like my FB page as well as others… 

    • Anonymous

      Sure. Just search for the person’s name, and then sort the list by the “Option” column (just click the column header). That should make it easy to scan down the list and see if all the mandatory entries are complete. Does that help, or am I missing something?

      One cause of the discrepancy could be if you had other entry options besides the Like. For instance, let’s say you had these three options:
        1. Like my Facebook Page
        2. Tweet a Message
        3. Follow me on Twitter

      If 100 people entered (and each did all the options), you’ll have 300 entries, but only 100 Like’s.

      I’m happy to help in any way I can. The grid is very powerful, and there’s a lot you can do with it, but it’s not incredibly easy-to-grasp. We’re interested in hearing about how you use it, or any questions you have so that we can make it better in the future.

      • Shannon Miller

        ok, one more question, is there a way to delete people off the grid if they haven’t done all required steps? 

        • Anonymous

          There isn’t. We took that ability out, because we found the most people weren’t using it. Check out my comment below for a little more info.

          Does that help? What are the pros/cons to that method?

          Thanks!

        • Your wish is our command :) – The option to delete entries is back in action. Enjoy!

  • Teresha

    this is awesome!!! can an invalid entry be deleted so that it’s no longer a part of the contest?

    • Your wish is our command :) – The option to delete entries is back in action. Enjoy!

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  • I’m just commenting to say how much I love how involved all the founders of Rafflecopter are. And your smiley-faces (and not-so-smiley-faces) kick butt, too. And the “OOPS. PLZ NICKNAME THE GIVEAWAY.” that appears, along with all the other punctuation you have fun with.

    Actually, I’ll just summarize this by saying that Rafflecopter rocks.

    • You’re making us lol :) Thanks for the comment, haha.

  • Heatherc191

    This is a bit useless for small giveaways if you can’t remove fraudulent entries.

    • Your wish is our command :) – The option to delete entries is back in action. Enjoy!

  • Shana

    Can we please go back to being able to delete entries if need be?  I have duplicate entries because people (who apparently cleared their cache or used a different computer) couldn’t use the tweet everyday button unless they went back and re-entered the mandatory options.  It doesn’t seem fair to the giveaway entrants. Thanks!

    • Your wish is our command :) – The option to delete entries is back in action. Enjoy!

  • Your wish is our command :) – The option to delete entries is back in action. Enjoy!

  • Shana

    Oh, thank you than you thank you!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  • Jan Messali

    Is there a way to delete complete contests… such as the Family Night Prize Pack Giveaway practice one?  (I notified Charlie Sheen that he won, but he hasn’t responded… it seems he’s just not that into Family Nights!)

    • Jan, you literally made me LOL. That’s hilarious :)

      You can delete whole giveaways, but only ones that are planned for the future. So if you set the start date to be, say, tomorrow, you’ll be able to delete it from the dashboard.

      Our thought was: you would never want to (especially accidentally) delete a current giveaway (people would be upset), or a giveaway that has a winner announced. However, you’re not the first person to be confused, and we’ll be making it easier to delete these in the future.

      Does that help?

      Thanks for taking the time to stop by and make us laugh :)

      • Jan Messali

        Glad I could make you smile. :)  I didn’t think about accidental deletions… yeah, that would be pretty horrible!  I think you’re right… better safe than sorry.

        Off to see what other crazy celebs have entered my giveaways!

  • A Helicopter Mom

    Thank you!!!!!!!

  • Anonymous

    Thank you so much for this!  Now off to figure this out! :)

  • Jen

    THANK you for adding the REMOVE button :)

  • Thank so much! Just used it now! Thanks guys, everyone loves it had so many people saying they love Rafflecopter!!

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  • Awesome sauce, all around. Thanks for everything!

  • Daily Woman

    I have the problem of doing the giveaway twice because I use different computers and they cant tell if I entered or not. I do not cheat on giveaways and I am afraid someone will think that is what is happening. If I try to do the daily entry and have to reenter the mandatory I usually write Duplicate in the space and hope they understand why I did it.
    Is this issue fixed yet?

    • Great question. The problem of having to re-do the mandatory option each day has been fixed. It’s no longer necessary to do the mandatory once-only options before doing the daily option. That way you can enter the daily option each day even if the widget has “forgotten” you.

      The problem of the widget not remembering you from computer is going to be fixed soon. We’re in the midst of working on an update that will introduce a sign-in system so the widget will remember you from computer-to-computer and site-to-site. It’s going to be pretty awesome :)

      Does that answer your question?

  • Ravzie

    I have been confused on whether or not you can enter through the different blog’s pages.  On some giveaways, it doesn’t really say, there are no real rules posted.  It looks like a different entry because you see blog A’s header, then blog B’s header looks different, etc.  I don’t want to be disqualified. 

    • Typically, unless the giveaway otherwise states, you should enter only once. I can see how that would be confusing though… we’re working on an update to fix that :)

  • I love the fact that we can moderate the entries.  For the most part, people have entered honestly at my blog, but the people that don’t do it honestly, must not know we can moderate the entries. 

    • Yes – we’ve seen that for the most part, folks entering Rafflecopter giveaways are honest, which is awesome! But for those that aren’t, we try to make it easy for you to find them :)

  • Georgia

    You can search the winner’s IP address to see if they entered
    under multiple names from the same computer.

    I do have something to say in regards to this statement and I am not saying it or trying to sound mean. My daughter and I live in the same house. We both have respectable blogs and we both do our own thing as to our blogs and our review and giveaways. But this statement above has limited our ability to enter other giveaways because we both share the same computer. I don’t have the money to go out and purchase another computer because someone might think we cheat because we have entered the same giveaway on from our 1 computer. I don’t cheat and I don’t look for cheaters on my giveaways. I only check to make sure that the person who was picked as the winner, has done the right thing as to the entries. I look at it this way, all those REAL cheaters, only made it good for the winner because if it was not for the CHEATER, that winner might of been someone else. “I hope that made sense.”

    • Georgia

      Don’t get me wrong, I love Rafflecopter. I am just saying that that statement does not mean that statement “Cheater entering under multiple names, same computer” is not always true. I am me and my daughter is her although we share the same computer.

  • Savingandsharingit

    Thank you for all the information.  I am looking forward to using Rafflecopter.

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  • OK, here’s my issue:

    I’m running a trial contest on our FB page.  The point is to gain “Likes” for the page.  I unliked the page, went to e the contest tab, and entered.  In my grid, it shows me as an entry and every filled that should be filled out is filled out.  How do I stop people from entering the contest without clicking “like” on the page?  If I can’t do that, how do I tell whether someone actually liked the page?

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  • Shelly

    I’d like to be able to actually see and click on things in the grid.. for instance, one of my entry options is, share this on fb leave the link to your share.. i can hover over it in the grid and see what they wrote in the box but i’d love to be able to highlight it so i could open in a new tab or whatever to make sure its legit.. just a suggestion.. I love rafflecopter regardless :)

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  • Guest

    The button “Remove entries” doesn’t work for me :'(

    I send you an email ~ Thanks for your answer huhu

  • Marie Connor

    A friend of mine has just told me that she was bidding on a raffle yesterday on grab yourself a bargain and when they did the draw she won but there was supposed to of been 2 winners and not 1 so the raffler drew again but instead of just drawing for the second one she drew two and they both ended up winning and my friend was knocked out with just an apology, what can she do about this pls????