JV giveaways are springing up right and left. I have added at least 6 to my JV giveaway directory in the last week. There are so many giveaways going on in the next couple weeks that I have decided to delay the giveaway that I am going to host.

I was going to do a Flag Day giveaway that would start on the 14th but have changed it to a Declaration of Independence Giveaway that will run around the 4th of July. But that's not what this post is about.

I know that a lot of you are just starting out with your list building and using giveaways. When you have limited resources and have a small list or no list at all, it can be a daunting proposition when you have to promote the giveaways you have joined.

For some of you, it may be a daunting task just to set up your gift in a giveaway. For those of you that need help, look in the side bar to the right in the "categories" drop down box and click on "How To Videos". There are a couple videos that will help you out.

When deciding which giveaways to promote, there a few things you should take into consideration:

1. Commission percentage – should be 75% or more for an upgraded contributor. This is a big one! I see some giveaways that are designed to make the host a lot of money. The contributors come second. If you are going to upgrade, you want to get the highest commissions possible on your referrals as well as you "special offers". This makes it easy to recoup the cost of upgrading.

Stephanie Mulac, in conjunction with Rodger Hyatt and Gary Simpson (a-la-me!), is proud to welcome you to her 4th Self Improvement Giveaway. The giveaway opened for contributors on Friday 11th December 2009 and will stay open right up until the 5th January 2010 when the site officially welcomes members (ie people who will be invited to browse the event looking at all the gifts on offer). In many respects the event is like a giant electronic trade fair where exhibitors (contributors) get to show their wares to the public (invited members from ezines, newsletters and other lists). Thousands of members are expected to flood the site and they will all be eager to see what’s on offer for them.

EARLY INDICATORS:

In just the first 3 days of Self Improvement 4 (SI4) 554 contributors have already signed on to offer their personal development and internet marketing products for others to sample. And this number is rising steadily every hour.

OPEN TO MEMBERS OF THE PUBLIC:

The public side of SI4 (ie when it opens to members of the public) will run from 5th January 2010 until 19th January 2010.

THE BIGGEST SELF IMPROVEMENT GIVEAWAY EVENT EVER:

SI4 is – WITHOUT DOUBT – the biggest self improvement giveaway event that has ever been staged on the internet. It’s also the most highly customized. Already contributors have expressed a lot of compliments over what they are seeing. The most common comments seem to use the word “unique” which is good because that was what was being strived for right from the start.

Today I want to talk to you about another Internet Marketing concept – that of the Joint Venture Giveaway, or more commonly just referred to as JV Giveaways.

WHAT IS A JV GIVEAWAY?

Basically, a JV Giveaway is a script that allows a marketer to invite a lot of other marketers to a web page to share their products in an event whereby the contributors (ie marketers) can offer their wares (e-books, reports, scripts, memberships etc) free to members (“customers”) in exchange for a person’s name and email address.

The marketer gains the subscriber and adds his or her name and email address to his list. The member gets whatever items they like the look of and can learn from for free. It’s a two-way exchange.

ONLINE JV GIVEAWAYS ARE LIKE REAL WORLD TRADE EXHIBITIONS:

Here’s a good way to conceptualize it if you are still wondering…

In essence, online JV Giveaways are like those big offline (real world) trade fairs we see from time to time where exhibitors put up their stalls and members of the public (and other exhibitors) get to wander around looking for items of interest.

WHAT’S THE BEST WAY OF GETTING STARTED IN JV GIVEAWAYS?

If you are new to Internet Marketing then the best way to understand them is to start out as a member and just go and have a look at how they work. There are a lot of details that I could add but it would probably only serve to confuse you. So, I encourage you to check a few out.

I have been using JV Giveaways to build my list ever since I first downloaded the Profit Pulling Platform that Alex Jeffreys gave all his students back in December of 2008. The ebook that came with it, "List Building With Alex", is all about how Alex used JV Giveaways to build his list when he first started out.

I have been using giveaways ever since and added 2000 subscribers to my list since then. There have been a few developements on the JV Giveaway scene that have caused more and more people to use JV Giveaways. There are also a lot of people who are hosting there own giveaways then before.

That is good news for me and you because we have more list building opportunities. I myself am going to host my own giveaway the end of this month and also have one in the works with some of my fellow students that we are going to co-host.

Hosting my own giveaway event should make my list swell up considerably. What I have found is that now that I actually have a list of sorts, I have an asset that I can use as levereage to add even more subscribers to my list. I use my list to send traffic to other people and get paid for it.

It's almost 2am but I have finally finished updating my JV giveaway directory. I had to redo 2 weeks worth of work plus add all of the new ones that have popped up in the last few days. I still can't believe how many giveaways are taking place in the next few weeks.

I haven't even set a date for mine yet. I was going to try and pick a date when there wouldn't be a lot of other competing giveaways but that doesn't look like it's going to happen. I will just have to come up with a way to make mine stand out.

The impact of Jason James Giveaway Riches is evident. He did a fantastic job explaining the ins and outs of running your own JV Giveaway. I know that I am using it as my guide and the fact that so many giveaways are springing up just after his launch is a testimonial to how good the product is.

Not only has he created a easy to follow step by step guide but he has obviously motivated a lot of people to take action. My hat goes off to him for creating an awesome product. I can't wait to get my giveaway off the ground.

My partners and I have been working hard although I have been working on getting other things straightened out. I am glad that I joined up with Garry Parkes, Gary Simpson, and Carl Barton. It would be really tough for me to go it alone this first time around.

I have seen a lot of my fellow students needing help with the whole JV Giveaway thing. I have built more than a few blogs and websites, so things like setting up a thank you page or a squeeze page are pretty much routine for me.

I do remember how much I struggled with tasks like this in the beginning so I totally understand people having problems with this. Just because you have detailed instructions or even a step by step video, it can still be a daunting undertaking for a newbie. For me, in the beginning, it was mostly very frustrating and time consuming.

I have come up with a solution for those of you who are struggling and want to get started with your list building. Here is what I propose.

I will set up the following for you at no cost.

• a squeeze page for the product that you want to give away.
• a thank you page that will alert your subscribers that they must check their email and confirm.
• a download page that your subscribers will be taken to after they confirm their opt in.
• I will set up your first follow up message in Aweber (must be Aweber)
• a video that will show you how to set all of this up yourself.
• a video that will show you how to take these same pages and make them work for other giveaways, simply by changing the information in a config file.