Using Google Alerts

I keep saying I was going to do a post on how to set up a "Google Alert", well guess what here it is! For those of you who want to search for sweeps or text to win contests setting up a Google Alert is the easiest way to do so. This is what the screen will look like. As you can see I have mine set up to go to my blog's email address

1. Go to Google Alerts 
2. Type in what you'd like to be alerted to in Search Query
3. Drop menu two for where you'd like to search
4. Select how often you'd like to be notified - as it happens, daily, or weekly
5. Select how many alerts you want - only the best or all
6. Deliver to - your email or RSS feed in Google Reader

My tips and tricks are to put the search query in quotes, otherwise you will get every single alert with a single word in it. I have alerts set up for "twitter parties", "text to win" and my name. Why my name you ask, because some companies do not "tag" you on Facebook sweep wins and give you a specific time frame to email them with your information. I've had this happen twice and lost out on one very big win because the company didn't know how to send a Facebook message and didn't tag me in their announcement, yes it made me upset.. but that's why I have an alert set up for my own name. I also use Everything setting along with Once A Day setting and get the summary in my email on a daily basis. Google Alerts are easy to use and make finding sweepstakes and Text to Win contests a cinch!! If you have any questions just leave me a comment and I'll try to answer them all!