Heads Up: Great Articles Coming, You Vote for Favorites and Can Win a Free Book

Last year at this time I hosted March Madness Free Money Finance Style where I pitted 64 of my best articles against each other. They squared off in a bracket competition similar to the NCAA basketball tournament where one article was finally crowned the best of all. This year, I'm going to shake things up a bit -- focusing on posts written by OTHER personal finance blogs -- as well as giving away prizes to boot. Here's how it will work:

• I'll create my own bracket system that will hold 64 posts.

• I'll fill it with the best 64 posts (as selected by me) that personal finance bloggers send me. If you have posts you want to include (let's limit it to four per blog) you can email the following to me: 1. The name of the post you're submitting, 2. the URL of the post you're submitting, 3. the trackback URL of the post you're submitting (if you allow trackbacks), and 4. two to five sentences on what makes this post so great (I'll be using this wording in the competition, though I reserve the right to edit it, so really "sell" your posts.) I need to receive all this by March 1. If I don't receive 64 submissions, I'll fill in the brackets with my own posts.

• I'll place the 64 posts randomly in the brackets.

• The posts will "play" each other with the winner advancing and the loser being bumped. They'll "play" in this manner: 1) I'll post the competing posts, listing who's playing who, 2) readers can leave comments on which they like better, 3) I'll ultimately decide a winner between the two taking the comments into account, and 4) the winner will advance in the bracket to "play" again. Ultimately, there will be only one post left -- the "champion" for this season. Criteria for great articles is as follows: 1) practicality of the post 2) how interesting/provocative/unique it is, 3) the "personal-ness" of it and 4) its impact on net worth.

• The winner will receive a packet of goodies (t-shirts and the like -- not food) courtesy of Moose Tracks ice cream.

As readers, every time you leave a comment in this competition, you have a chance to win too. I have five copies of the book The Net Worth Workout: A Powerful Program for a Lifetime of Financial Fitness (see my rating for details) that I'll be giving away to the five best commenters during this series -- the people who put the most time and effort into their comments in helping to select the winners. Yes, bloggers who enter their posts can comment/win as well.

I will give away the five books noted above, but if there are more than five great commenters, I may give additional prizes as well. I have a good amount of prize material I can give away if people get really involved.

Here's how the giveaway works:

To be eligible to win a book, just leave a comment on any of the March Madness posts this year. (Yes, you can leave multiple comments per post, but be sure they are good -- quantity without quality will not win.) At the end of the competition, I'll review all the comments and select the winners.

A few rules for these giveaways:

1. You can not win more than one copy of the book.

2. I will be the complete and final judge.

3. U.S. mailing addresses only. (I'm on a budget here, after all.)

4. Legal disclaimer: I can not guarantee safe delivery of the items. I will mail them to you free of charge via U.S. Mail, but if for any reason they do not reach you, arrive torn or are damaged in any way I can't be held responsible. I've mailed lots of giveaways and never had a problem, but you just never know (especially with the mail.)

5. If you do not contact me within a week of winning, I reserve the right to give your copy away to another winner. Note: I won't track down the winner -- it's your responsibility to come back and see if you won.

Good luck!

Comments

[Blaine Moore (First Time Homeowner)]

Sounds like a good time!

I'm looking forward to it, FMF>

[efipo.com]

Sweet contest. I'm in for sure!

[Jo]

Sounds Wonderful!!

[Joel]

Good Job!

[My New Choice]

Very cool idea! Just submitted a few of my posts and am looking forward to see if I make it to the big dance!

[Sun]

This is a great idea. Just submitted my posts and can't wait it to come out.

[Investor Trip]

Awesome idea. I was thinking on the lines of a similar idea for March Madness myself.

A cool feature would be to setup the brackets like ESPN.com does, so people can vote on their favorite post matchups live.

Got any ideas on how to accomplish this? My contest would be slightly different though. Instead of personal finance post, my readers could vote on Best Performing Stocks for 2007.

Let me know if you find the software to do this.

[Madame X]

Great idea! Now someone just needs to start a pool so everyone can bet on who the winner will be!

[The Digerati Life]

I just sent you my entries. I hope not to be too disappointed here...;) Looking forward to the challenge and the super high quality submissions that you no doubt attracted!

[March Madness]

You could set up a lens at Squidoo.com and use their Plexo feature to make a list of the articles. Once the list is made users have the option to vote up or down on individual items.

You can also allow for visitors to add their own items to the list. You should check it out. I just created a lens for March Madness at www.squidoo.com/March-Madness-Basketball/. I used the Plexo feature to allow visitors to vote on who they think the Number One seeds will be in this years tournament.

The funny thing about all this - I found this website by searching for "march madness bracketology" at google. Didn't think I would find a finance website with those terms. You were the 7th link on the first page of results.

Very cool site by the way. Have a Great Day!

[FMF]

Good idea! Something to remember for the future.

Funny that I'd rank 7th for that set of words. ;-)

[Ieshia Dukes]

I think this is a good idea. I like the way your catching commenters attention by saying they can have a chance to win if they have the best comment.

[Brittany Cospelich]

I found this article to be somewhat interesting. It's a very good idea. It's a realy great challenge for people that like to blog, but if you don't like to blog then its just not for you. If you dont get to win at leats you get the chance to get some practice in for up coming competitions. Im sure people will be delighted to fill out some brackets for you. Its sounds like someone is going to have a wonderful time!