How many entries should you send in for various sweepstakes? This is a question we receive often. They answer is: The number that is right for you. There are many different ways that you can approach your sweepstakes entries.

If you are just starting to enter sweepstakes and you have a small budget, we suggest entering online sweepstakes whenever possible. Also, focus more on postcard entries rather than 3x5 entries. You can get in more entries for your dollar. Enter sweepstakes that have more than one grand prize. Sure, the prize for a sweepstakes with the single grand prize might be nice, but your chances of winning will be better for a sweepstakes that offers multiple prizes. Enter more phone-ins, local drop-ins, and radio contests. Try to enter at least once for snail-mail sweepstakes that you are interested in, and enter a few more times for those sweepstakes that you are VERY interested in. Contests are good to focus on, too. There is always less competition for contests because they take more effort to enter.

As your budget increases, enter more snail-mail sweeps. For example, here's our approach. For every sweepstakes that we are eligible to enter, we enter at least once or twice for the ones we are interested in. If we are VERY interested in the prizes, we'll enter about 5 to 10 times. If we are EXTREMELY interested in the prizes, we'll enter up to about 20 or 25 times over the life of the sweepstakes. We find that these numbers have been very successful for us. Your mileage may vary. :-)

Subscriber Donna H. in Georgia has another method. "I only enter once. I never send in more than one entry. I win about 4 grand prizes a year, so I'm not going to change it now." She says that her biggest wins are from snail-mail entries and local grocery store promotions. "I enter lots of online sweepstakes, but I haven't won anything big yet from those." Kathy Marcus in Michigan has another method that works for her. "I like to pick out just a couple of good ones and enter about 50 times. If there's something that I really really want, I send in some more. I don't enter for the ones giving trips, though. I'm really picky about what I enter."

As you start getting more wins, you'll be able to tell what methods seem to work better for you. If you keep track of your entries, you'll know how many wins you have using different kinds of entries (online, postcard, drop-in, etc.). The most important thing to remember is that you can't win if you don't enter. This is a hobby, not an exact science. Different things are going to work for different people, so just keep entering until you find a good balance that works for you.