iWon Less But At Least More Often

They’re going to be winning a little more often, but pocketing less at iWon.com as the loyalty portal shrinks its cash prize structure thanks to the “difficult economy.”

A notice on the Web site headlined “Announcing Changes to the iWon Prize Structure” talks about feedback from users who want more prizes.

But it goes on to say: “Why are we making changes to the prize structure? Nearly every business has been impacted in some way by the difficult economy. While we’ve navigated through it with flying colors, running a successful Web portal is a long-distance race. With this in mind, and with your overwhelming feedback to guide us, we made the changes to our prize structure that give us greater flexibility in the future while giving you more chances than ever to win cash.”

Well, there may be more prizes and more chances to win, but the dollar amounts are substantially less in some cases, resulting in considerable savings for the privately held company.

Now there will be 100 prizes of $1,000 a month in place of the $1 million prize. That adds up to a savings of $900,000 a month right there.

iWon also said there will be 10 prizes of $1,000 each weekend (In place of Saturday and Sunday $10,000 prizes). That’s another $10,000 saved.

The $10,000 prize each weekday remains, as does the iWon Tax Day 2002 Prize – up to $25 Million.

iWon spokeswoman Erica Bates told internetnews.com in an email that: “iWon maintains its position as the largest guaranteed cash giveaway on the Internet and continues to give away cash and prizes while providing world-class content and information. iWon, whose backers include Bain Capital, JP Morgan Partners and Viacom, will reach profitability in the next few months – less than two years after launching.”

Launched in October of 1999, Irvington, NY-based iWon offers registered users entries in a cash prize drawing in exchange for clicking on various ads and other links.