What Other Competition Websites Do You Use?
News
I use
latestdeals
prizefinder
loquax
anyothers out there
Hey
Would be great to hear what you like about LD compared to the other sites and, even better, what we might do to improve
I like the pictures. Most don't do that. Also the fact that answers are given for the competitions.
Comments are in a more logical place than Loquax and the chat pages are easier to find and use.
There aren't as many competitions as Loquax which is probably because that is a competition site rather than a deals site and has been going a lot longer but I wonder if the number of postings could be increase slightly. There is no restriction of the number that people can put up but it is human nature to hold back competitions found until the next day and they may end up not posted. If this is done, I think there should be a limit on the number of winits that count for points or the site will be flooded with them.
I did make a comment yesterday about a problem with reporting a post as a duplicate which I may have put in the wrong place and I think it would help to have one place to report technical problems. It's obviously not a major problem so far as the duplicate is concerned but I seem to occasionally have problems with accurate URLs not being accepted so wonder if it is a glitch.
On the whole, I think that it is the best site of its kind and any issues are fairly trivial. It is the friendliest site. I was put off Loquax when I got a snotty response when I put up an innocuous comment to say that I had won a competition. I think if that happened here, other people would step in so I do use it but I don't interact with it.
Jaycee5 Hey thanks for the awesome feedback
Just going to jump on the tech/bug reporting point - I tend to try and scoop every bug report up wherever I see it and add it to my to-do list to tackle. Sadly my to-do list is of epic proportions and sometimes it takes a little while to get to it!
I have to confess, I'm not entirely sure myself what my preferred method of bug reports is I'd perhaps suggest using the contact us page and selecting "Tech support" from the dropdown. I'll maybe look to add a "Bug report" as an alternative option as then I'll be able to keep them all sorted in my inbox.
Another solid approach is to just keep tagging me in posts where a bug happens or just generally to remind me if a bug hasn't been fixed after a week or so. I promise I won't get annoyed - I can just be a little scatty sometimes!
Jaycee5 It's true people are friendly here at latest deals when you post, but not so at facebook. I've seen so many snotty comments there some aimed at other people, and when I posted my comedy win from a week or so ago at facebook, I thought some people were being *ssholes. I think more moderating needs to happen at facebook. People post nasty comments there.
ShellyAnn That's a shame. I rarely use facebook any more because of that. I'm all for freedom of speech but some people seem to spend all their time on the site doing nothing but being nasty. The latest changes are making it unusable. Having an algorithm that pushes trolls to the top is beyond stupid but the people running it don't listen to the users. I use forums much more because they do tend to get moderated in a way that still allows people to have their say but without abuse - and no one becomes a billionaire from them.
ShellyAnn I no longer use facebook - just like twitter its just full of people looking for what they call "confirmation" - people who just want to prove how intelligent and more knowledgeable than you are - simple discussions just end up in pages of pointless arguments and besides I object to facebooks political leanings and treatment of certain groups and individuals and its support of certain religious groups above others when it is supposed to be neutral - Switzerland it aint!
Sadly even forums go that way - I was a member of Futurenoir and the Scifichannel forums way back ten years ago and they had to close because of trolls - there were a lot of good people on there that became firm friends like Lemerchand and others that lost all contact - shame - Same with moneyworld.co.uk the forum had to close there as well - it always happens but its a microchosm of the world we live in!
HUKD was a popular competition site but in the middle of last year, it dramatically altered its layout and seemed to want to
discourage posters, at its peak it was posting about 5 pages of 20 competitions per page, per day, occasionally more.
MSE competition page is probably the most subscribed to, but its format is pretty awful, however there are
several committed compers who keep a high number of competitions posted.
Their "Take a Break" section has 890 voters at least.
Loquax, its a good site, recently Loquax posters have been copying posts from this site - which is unusual..
A loquax Cash competition had 181 votes.
It lacks "user friendly attributes" though it seperates "Daily Competitions", "popular magazine competitions"
we don't (as yet) have anyone posting the "Chat" "Take a Break" and many other magazines,
apart from Jaycee5 who posts "TV Choice"
I do know Bauer media discourage posting answers to their magazine titles, as it went for a small site called Deany's Designs
https://www.deanysdesigns.co.uk/magazines/ which has reduced its activity.
I noticed recently that one of the high value LatestDeals win money prizes had exceeded 600 entries.
which is on a par with HUKD at its peak, its hard to judge accurately as HUKD members
who were "pioneers" or "VIP's" had 6 votes, new posters 1 vote, others 2,3,4,5, etc.
I think Jaycee5 & ShellyAnn have made good points
This is a good site for many reasons, its clear and relatively easy to follow, the fact that the Founders are visible, communicating
and posting makes it different to any other site. No anonymous "Contact us"
So LatestDeals is a great site growing better.
I rarely post Facebook or Twitter competitions mostly sticking to Website.
One question that is often wondered about is "Why do people post competitions and answers, why don't they keep quiet?
I have won some amazing prizes thanks to unselfish posters, i.e. Sandals/Jamaica, Cash prizes from ITV etc.
I have been posting competitions for some time here (LD) and at HUKD previously, it honestly has not affected my win ratio.
Its also good to give back.
I agree with Jaycee5 & ShellyAnn this is a friendly site, without heavy handed moderators or helpers,
in fact your guidelines and advice to monitors reflects this and is spot on.
I came here from HUKD which I liked but I am surprised that they keep the competition page open now. I hadn't realised that is owned by a US corporation and I prefer the idea of using a small more personal British site.
I agree about the format of MSE. I did use it a bit for some of the advent competitions and have double check answers there when they have been queried but I agree about the format. It is all over the place.
Loquax have blocked competitions from Landlove because apparently their terms and conditions exclude sharing their competitions - but it the same T&C's as sites like YourHome mag which they do post along with several others. It seems that it is some years ago since Landlove challenged them so they may have softened now. It was the logo that Bauer did not like Deanys using. They do still give the answers to most of the weekly competitions.
I have noticed Loquax copying comps from LD as well. I wonder if some of their posters have switched to LD.
Competition Database as the format makes it really easy to enter and keep track of what you've entered.
Moneysupermarket is too convoluted and is a real mess as a website design - just too much on screen at the one time and Hotukdeals is too full of arguments and personal attacks and the layout isnt as good as Latestdeals - As an old style programmer myself although I used to program machine code arcade games for Sega and others back in the 80's I have done some web design and I do like the speed and minimalism of Latesdeals. No superflous flash and javascript to slow the experience down - KISS!
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