When you enter a giveaway, do you always know where your information is going?
So, are you wondering why I asked this question? You should. There are giveaways on this blog. Some of the giveaways are either my own or sponsored by a company through my blog. Some of the giveaways are group giveaways that I participate in. Some of the giveaways are small, and some of them are large. However, they all have something in common… You have to give some personal information in order to enter. You may have to log in with Facebook or give your name and email address in order to complete various entry methods. BUT do you know WHERE your personal information is going?
Until recently, I lived in oblivion thinking that companies understood that we bloggers are protective of our readers’ information. A month or so ago, I realized that this is no longer the case. I have been approached by 3 different companies in the last month or so asking me to either out-and-out share email addresses from a contest or use the companies widget so that the entries from my readers would go directly to them. I want you to know that I told these companies NO. Well, I didn’t respond to one, and I told the other two NO. You see, I like my privacy, and I’m sure that you like yours. Companies need to know that it is not alright to glean email addresses from giveaways hosted on blogs. Obviously, the winner’s information has to be shared with the company, but they should not have access to every entrant’s email.
When I participate in a group giveaway, I don’t have the ability to safeguard your personal information. I want you to be aware of this. The blogger that is leading the giveaway is the one who is in control of the giveaway widget. Please only share information that you feel comfortable sharing when entering any giveaways.
Please know that I will never knowingly hand over your email addresses to anyone. I can’t control the information shared when entering a group giveaway, but for any giveaway that is just listed on my blog (not group giveaways), your email address will remain in the Rafflecopter and only be shared IF you are the winner.
If you enter a giveaway on another website/blog/Facebook page and start getting emails that you didn’t sign up for, make sure you let the company know that you don’t appreciate getting unsolicited emails.
This is a great reminder that we should all disclose only the information we’re comfortable with! Honesty is not always a given when dealing with larger companies and corporations and we should be making sure we don’t reveal too much of our personal information when entering giveaways (when we don’t know where the info is ultimately going).