If you were to browse the top broadcasters of a hyped game the day of its release, you are guaranteed to find [Giveaways!] in almost every other title. For many twitch users, this alone can be a heavy influence on who they will choose to watch for the day. This article will list a few easy ways to run giveaways on and off stream, and go into detail about some methods!

Some might think giveaways are a gimmick or a cheap way to attract viewers, but in reality they are a great way to simultaneously grow your community and give back to your viewers. However, there is such thing as an over saturation of giveaways. If you fall into the trap of constantly having Giveaway in your title and running giveaways in your channel, occasionally resulting in it being the focus of the stream and you can build the expectation that giveaways will happen. Once this expectation of giveaways has built it can be very difficult to shake and you may find viewers frequently asking about giveaways, so be careful to not abuse what is a fantastic tool for streamers big and small.

Giveaways while live

Running giveaways while live can be difficult if it means you have to pause the game, ignore chat, and possibly miss notifications while setting it up. Luckily, most of the popular twitch bots have built in giveaway systems that work from chat and can even be done by your mods!

• Moobot offers a raffle system that can be run from chat commands by the moderators, or from your dashboard. Currently only available for Twitch.
  • First, you must turn on the raffle system which can be found in the features tab of your dashboard:
  • Then, you or your moderators can start, close, and draw for a raffle from chat using the following chat commands. You can also skip the entry process and draw a winner from your viewer list!

• Nightbot is one of the most commonly used bots across Twitch and offers a quick and simple way to run giveaways on their beta dashboard. Currently available for Twitch and YouTube Gaming.
  • To run one simply head to the dashboard and head to the giveaway tab. From there you can select your method of giveaway; active user, key word, and random number.
  • Then setup the giveaway to your needs and wants, even selecting who want to be able participate.
  • You then hit “Roll it!” to open and close it whenever you are ready to draw a winner.

• Branebot handles giveaways differently, with more control over the giveaway but currently no way to run it from the chat. Branebot is currently only compatible with Twitch.
  • Whether you are a streamer or moderator, you’ll first go to the branebot console and access the giveaway section:
  • After fine tuning the giveaway to your needs, hit start and let branebot do the work:
• BlipBot offers a simple system that allows your run and start giveaways directly in chat. BlipBot is currently only available on Beam.
  • Once you have authorized BlipBot in your stream, head to the dashboard and check you have the Raffle options enabled.
  • You or one of your moderators can then start a raffle in chat by typing in “!raffleset keyword” in chat to start the giveaway, then “!raffleend” to draw the giveaway.
  • Alternatively you can set up a random number giveaway. Where you set a range of numbers, the bot picks a random number, and the first viewer to guess the number is the winner.

• MeowBot provides you with a quick and easy solution to running giveaways, with some basic options. MewoBot is only available on Hitbox.
  • First you will need to add MeowBot to your stream by clicking the “Connect with hitbox” button in the top right of the page.
  • Once in chat, you or your moderators can then run giveaways by using the following commands:

Offline Giveaways

While chat giveaways can draw in viewers and increase chat activity, they aren’t great for growing your social presence outside your stream. Here are a few giveaway systems that are great at growing your twitter and steam groups while still accomplishing the stream growth and giving back to your community!

• Gleam has proven to be a great platform for running giveaways, and the chances are you’ve entered a few contests yourself. The system is easy to use, and can result in huge social media growth. Gleam has 3 plans, a free plan and 2 paid plans. The 2 paid plans offer greater options, with the higher tier having more.
  • Firstly simply sign up and create a free account. Once on the dashboard, click “New Competition” in the top right.
  • You will then be presented with 5 pages to fill out. The first being the setup; where fill in the name, start and end date, and Terms and Conditions/Details.
  • Secondly you will need to fill in the information the user will need to fill out in order to be able to enter.
  • The next step will allow you to add ways which people can enter the giveaway and the amount of entries each task gives the user. You will be able to choose from things such as following on Twitch, subscribing on Twitch, following on Twitter, retweeting a tweet, subscribing on YouTube, referring friends, and many more.
  • The last two steps will require you to input the prize information and go over the post entry settings, such as email confirmation.

• Rafflecopter offers a service much similar to that of Gleam, but doesn’t have the same level of integration that Gleam does. Though it is arguably quicker and easier to setup, and has a handy duplicate tool when setting up more than one giveaway or running one at a later date. Again like Gleam, there are both paid tiers and a free version available, but the paid tiers do offer analytics for your giveaways.
  • To setup just sign up on the website and head to the dashboard.
  • Hit the “New giveaway” button and head through the quick steps to create your giveaway. On the first page input the item you’re giving away, how users can enter, and the start and end time.
  • On the second page you are given an embed link if you have website, an option to post direct to a Facebook fan page, and are given some basic customization options. Then you are good to go, just distribute the link to enter to your community.
  • The final tab on the giveaway page will list all the entries recieved for the giveaway.

There are many more giveaway tools out there than we have listed in this article, some may even be tailored more specifically to your channel needs. There is one thing for certain, giveaways are a great way for to not only thank and give back to your pre-existing viewer base, but hopefully attract new people into your community.

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