How to win Indiblogger contests?

Um, what of happy hours? I feel they are better- as you are then sure to win something. Contests: haven't taken part in anything. So, i can't really say.

 and was supplemented with two videos and four images.

Were those videos and images created by you?

Contests are more about writing a blog post that impresses the judges / makes the judges feel that you have worked hard rather than writing a truly literary piece.

Showing that you worked hard - Write a loooong blog post - 34-4k words or a looong poem 

Creative - Create comic strips, add some artwork etc

It is very rare that winners are chosen based on literary merit.

As Shivam pointed out, try participating in happy hours and if your IndiRank is high enough, apply for IndiOne where you will be paid a predecided amount on completing the given tasks.

my longggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg posts never win

nor my loooooooooong poem

nd I'm sure you never wrote a 4k post. and even if you had written one, the judges might not have read it because of the black background. 

my explorer post was beyond 4k...it was brown background...many posts between 3-4 k with white post background

may be it is because of your blog theme. But still, you have won a lot of contests. 

The videos were from YouTube, and three of the images were mine.

I am not incapable of writing a lengthy post (one of my recent posts was 5,600 words long, although that was not for a contest). However, I find it difficult to stay focused and on the topic in lengthy posts.

Yes, the Happy Hours is a good suggestion. I think that I will try the current one--the Airbnb--it seems to be a good fit for my blog.

P.S. My IndiRank is close, but not close enough for IndiOne. One year ago, my rank was 81 (and it had been as high as 86). I wish there was IndiOne back then.

Here is the thread ND was talking about:

https://www.indiblogger.in/forum/topic.php?id=17995

god knows, mickey. I too am waiting to get something hopefully. I think winners may divulge their secret or you can go through winning entries and see where you can improve upon.

" I too am waiting to get something hopefully" - Don't say that Rio - you have won stuff in the past though not the really really big ones.

those were t shirts, that I got for each entry. that everyone with valid entry got. then spa voucher, nothing significant. but yes, participation was fun.

Sometimes it is a matter of luck too. If you participate in enough contests, you will start winning - I went 14-15 contests without even winning a girlish pink T-shirt. Then started winning things - though never the big stuff - but decent - 1-3 K worth stuff at time and one time got a 13 k voucher as well.

Congratulations! 1-3 worth of stuff would be appreciated by me, although I do not think that I would want T-shirts of any kind.

having participated in different contests, i always feel that the winners have something different. it is their writing style, emotional touch, depiction/presentation etc. i tried to improve upon but yet to find the manta for winning this contests. till then i just keep trying and learning from winners (  i got 2 1K vouchers and prize in one competition where i was able to convince my friends for a cause(judging was not on writing, but it was on amout collected))

Totally understand your situation, Micky and it's really great to hear that your are proud of your entries. Same is the case of with me. As they say, you are never a looser if you know if you have given your best and I do believe that your satisfaction is the best prize that anyone can ever give to you!

I guess, IndiContests are more about churning out ideas that make you stand out from the rest of the crowd. It's not always about creativity and never about length of the post. Just that X-factor - something like your own signature which makes it so unique that it is impossible to not filter it out from the rest of the crowd. That X factor could be anything that catches the eye of the judges. Of course then, there is always the 'luck' factor that often comes with a question sign of its own. All this I speak from my personal experience of participating in quite many IndiTravel contests, winning a few dream-prizes like all expense paid trips to Japan and Melbourne and (more recently) loosing many more! 

It is about experimenting with your writing style and the way you have framed your query, I am sure you are already on the right path. I wish you win soon! All the best! 

I have submitted my entries for few contests, first time after joining Indiblogger few months back. The results are yet to be out. Feeling excited! But as Arti pointed out very correctly, putiing best foot forward is important and I guess I have done that. This very thing, does give me a feeling of satisfaction. But nothing can beat the feeling of winning. I hope to win and if dont, I hope to learn and brace myself for future challenges.

You just completed my answer, Aritra - thanks! 

But nothing can beat the feeling of winning. I hope to win and if I dont, I hope to learn and brace myself for future challenges.

^^  And, kudos to your attitude - it's awesome! 

Hi mickey,  first of all I salute your endeavour for raising such a candid question, which many may perceive to be juvenile and may give rise to a backlash. 

The question also piqued in myself an interest to plot out the various variables required in order to present a post deemed fit to win a contest, though I would have liked to plot equations but my maths is horrendously week.

Anyways, the first task at hand was to see why you have not won any prizes and so I opened your blog. The first thing I noticed is that the theme of your blog is not optimised for mobile when choosing the option for "request desktop site", therefore I had to do with a very basic bland mobile optimised theme while browsing through your site.(it is said first impression it's last impression)

Second, oh my god !you are legendary when it comes to writing a long blog post. I assure you I read a lot of blogs and your blog might have the longest posts in india (this is ofcourse exclusive of technical blogs). In fact it took me almost an hour to reach your blog post for a contest since I was so caught up in read your entries. By the way, I like your sense of writing and your opinions as an expat was engrossed in fifth and sixth flag. Now I like to read long posts, but these were really too long even for my capacity so kudos.

Third, the post I read was banking with jifi kotak. I liked reading the post, your sense of English English and content structuring is impeccable according to blogging standards. However, this does not help with contests. Your opinions are brazen with devil may cry attitude so much reminding me of a certain colonel patton type of military person, I .E you are not afraid to mince words to call a coward a coward. You take into account factual realities while writing post and at times, your language is concise, precise yet bland at the same time since every sentence is written with logic and coherence. 

Fourth: and it troubles me to say this, but your blog as it is in the current form is not suitable for contests and infact bring disrespect to your sense of writing & your blogpost content.

You might have noticed in winning posts that the post is written at a very jolly cho  chweet (sweet) feminist nature that present itself as if it were an ad writeup for the brand with so much imitation to create a feel good feel, this is not you. Your writing represents a mature experienced person and the only blogger I can think of in your age group currently is mister arvind passey. You can have a look at his blog if that helps.

My suggestion: keep your current blog as completely sepperate for your personal requirements and start a new blog just to participate in contests, write shorter posts for this contest blogs. 

Your writing represents a mature experienced person and the only blogger I can think of in your age group currently is mister arvind passey. You can have a look at his blog if that helps.

and the person you named has won max contests...so i think the thread starter has chance too

Thank you sneh for your exhaustive and informative reply.

I am surprised that my blog is not mobile-optimized. I think, though, that your statement is because you are not aware of the laptop/desktop version of my blog. I have the Dynamic template of Blogger which is a very minimalist template, and which I appreciate. It has none of the bells and whistles that most other blogs have. If you do not see much of my blog on mobile then I think that it is simply because of the template that I chose. If you do not see much of my blog on mobile then you probable will not see much more on laptop/desktop.

Yes, I have confessed more than once that my posts are long. Years ago, I wrote whatever I wanted. However, as a writer, I also read a great deal. I have found that my mind begins to wander off if a post that I am reading is more than 2,000 words in length. Thus, I now try to limit myself to such posts, and to break up a post if there is a logical and rational reason for doing so. Yes, my Fifth Flag post was excrutiatingly long. However, I split it up into the following Sixth Flag post AND the TWO posts that I called My Twentieth Year Anniversary. Thus, the idea that I presented was already broken up into four posts. Yes, I could have still broken the Fifth Flag post into four separate posts (as there was a logical and rational reason for doing so. However, that would then have broken the theme of "Flags".

Yes, I understand the concept of contests: that the post should be favourable to the sponsor. I think that an apt example of this is my Great Features, Lenovo Has post. I am proud of the article because it showed my creative side, but slightly embarrassed because it had no relevance to my blog.

Yes, I suppose that I could start a new blog just for contests. However (other than the aforementioned Great Features post), I try to enter contests (and now Happy Hours--thanks for the suggestion, Shivam) that have some relevance to my blog. Moreover, if a potential sponsor sees my reviews and likes them then I would have no objection to the company sponsoring my efforts.

I think that the solution may be to write longer posts for the contests. These posts, historically, have been shorter than average. At the same time, I think that the posts have to be more succinct and cogent. I think that my recent Swachh India entry fulfills those criteria. I hope that the judges agree and appreciate it.

P.S. Thanks Nandini and Rajnith for the referenced thread. I shall have to re-read it a few times to digest all the ideas presented there.

Personally, I think the posts are just too long.... Told Mickey that earlier. The average modern reader has the attention span of a - SQUIRREL!! - 5 year old. See the popularity of Twitter....

I don't get it, personally, but I'm just an old dude who had English grammar piped into him by a fireman's hose over several years and who reads ****ens, Hardy, Shakespeare etc... for fun. I'll never enter an IB contest because I can't use the prizes because I live overseas. That was reason 1. The other reason is - my posts are just too weird and personal and my writing style is also very old fashioned and not at all what will win prizes.

Reason 3: I'm a lazy old man.

I'm affronted that you did not think of me, Sneh, as a blogger in that age group.... I shall go away and sulk for a few hours now.

Charles uncle too must be sulking I guess. Or maybe just turning in his grave.   

Charles?

'...reads Charles, Hardy, Shakespeare, etc...' #Nevermind. 

P.S. All figure in my favourites list.

oh ok Got it! yeah IB keeps blanking out Charles' lastname....