Let the fun begin! Sam’s Club new campaign – Giving Made Simple! (CONTEST CLOSED)

If you’re a fairly new subscriber to my blog you may have missed all of the fun from the holiday campaign I worked on with Sam’s Club, but you’re in luck – because here we go again!

Anyone who has read this blog (or who knows me in real life, for that matter) knows that I’m passionate about charity work and helping others. This enthusiasm for philanthropy extends to corporations, too – if I know that a company does good work within my community or donates funds to a cause I feel connected to, it makes me feel good about shopping there. There are a lot of companies that do charity work only during the holidays or just for some good marketing – and I suppose there’s nothing wrong with that, really. At the end of the day all that matters is that the charities get some more funding to do more good work, right?

But when I heard about Sam’s Club’s Giving Made Simple program, which not only has nothing to do with any holidays but also gives a substantial amount of money to every charity participating, I was thrilled. And, don’t you worry, there’s plenty of opportunities for you to get involved too!

There are eight charities that are in the running for two $1 million prizes – but those who don’t win the million dollars will still walk away with a minimum of $250,000! There are two categories of charities – Youth Education (Junior Achievement, YMCA, Girls Inc., Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship) and Entrepreneurship (Accion USA, Corporation for Enterprise Development, Community Reinvestment Fund USA, Kiva). Each organization does truly wonderful work and it’s really hard to pick just one! But we all have causes and beliefs that are close to our hearts and, remember, there are no losers here!

So, how exactly does this work? Well, Sam’s Club members can log-on to www.samsclub.com/giving or Sam’s Club’s Facebook page every day (starting today April 8th and ending on May 2nd) and vote for their favorite charity. Or, on Saturday April 10th, you can vote in-store while shopping at your local Sam’s! Once the voting ends, the two charities with the highest votes in their categories will each get $1 million, second-place winners will receive $500,000 each, and the third- and fourth-place winners will receive $250,000 each.

To celebrate the kickoff of this amazing contest, Sam’s Club is giving away two $50 gift cards! If you’re not a member of Sam’s Club yet, you can use this $50 prize to cover your membership fee. If you’re already a member of Sam’s, use this gift card for anything your little heart desires!

The rules for this giveaway are a little different, so pay attention to make sure your entry is accepted! There are even two opportunities for daily entries – tweeting and commenting with your choice of charity.

1. If you’re a Sam’s Club member – Cast your vote at Giving Made Simple and leave a comment there. Then let me know which charity you voted for and the name you used to cast your vote!

2. If you are not a Sam’s Club member, you can still enter by promoting this campaign on your blog, Twitter or Facebook by encouraging people to vote! (Must leave direct link to blog post, Facebook or Tweet to count} Here is a sample tweet:

Giving Made Simple by Sam’s Club-Vote on which charity gets a portion of 4 MILLION DOLLARS!! http://www2.samsclub.com/Giving/ #samsgiving

Extra Entries (only valid after required entry above is made)

-Vote daily! Just come back and let me know which organization you voted for and the name you voted with! One extra entry.

-Subscribe to my blog. Current subscribers count too! Two extra entries.

-Enter any other giveaway on my blog. Two extra entries per giveaway entered.

-Follow Sam’s Club on Twitter. Leave your username for verification. One extra entry.

-Follow me on Twitter. Leave your username for verification. One extra entry.

-Tweet the following message (can be done daily):

Win $50 Sam’s Club GC (2 WINNERS!) & read about Sam’s Giving Made Simple $4 Million charity contest! http://tinyurl.com/y9fbu3z #samsgiving

-Follow me on google friend connect. One extra entry.

This giveaway is open to residents of the US until May 2nd at 10 PM EST. Winners will be emailed and will have 48 hours to respond or a new winner will be chosen.

Sam’s Club provided me with two $50 gift cards to give away to my readers and one $100 gift card for my participation in this campaign throughout the month of April.