How To Use An Instagram Giveaway Picker To Choose Winners

Instagram comment contests are a proven way to increase engagement and start meaningful conversations with your audience.

To launch your giveaway, create a compelling Instagram post that introduces the prize, explains how to enter, and encourages users to leave a comment. This format is quick to set up and low effort for participants, which can help drive a high number of entries.

You can prompt users to answer a question, tag a friend, share ideas, or drop a specific emoji — anything that fits your brand’s tone. Clear instructions improve participation and make it easier to select winners later.

When you are running a giveaway with hundreds (or thousands) of comments, choosing a winner manually becomes time-consuming, error-prone, and difficult to validate.

Gleam offers a dedicated Instagram Quick Draws tool that lets you pick a random winner fairly and efficiently. This random name picker pulls eligible entries directly from your Instagram post and gives you options to:

• Filter comments by keyword or hashtag
• Set rules for duplicate entries
• Randomly select one or more winners
• Export results if needed for audits or transparency

Whether you're running a one-off contest or part of a larger campaign, this tool helps you meet platform rules, reduce manual work, and maintain trust with your audience.

If you are exploring other options, a few simple alternatives exist.

The Instagram Random Comment Picker by Comment Picker allows you to paste the URL of your post and generate a winner at random.

This is a free and lightweight option, but it lacks features like filtering, exporting, or duplicate handling — which can be limiting in larger giveaways.

If you already have a list of valid usernames (e.g. from form entries or filters), Gleam's Random Name Picker allows you to paste the list and pick winners randomly.

This tool works best for closed or verified entry pools. It does not connect directly to Instagram but is fast and easy to use.

For more complex campaigns, Gleam allows you to import Instagram comments as a tracked action within a full giveaway flow.

Using the Instagram Comment Import action, you can:

• Automatically sync comments into your campaign
• Apply keyword or hashtag filters
• Limit entries by frequency (e.g. one per user)
• Export a report for audits or compliance
• Pick a winner from verified entries using Gleam

You can also exclude users manually, apply eligibility criteria, or redraw winners — ideal for brands and creators who run frequent or multi-step campaigns.

Photo contests are a powerful way to generate user-generated content, connect with your audience, and grow organically through social media engagement. Instagram is the perfect platform to showcase entries and build buzz around your brand.

With Gleam, you can run Instagram photo contests that either:

• Import posts using hashtags and @mentions
• Collect images directly through the contest widget
• Automatically track submissions, apply filters, and display entries in a public gallery

Want to go beyond a random selection? Gleam lets you create full-featured contests that drive more value — collect emails, grow your audience, and reward behaviour across social media platforms.

Whether you want to increase your number of entries, collect leads, or encourage referrals, Gleam's giveaway tools help you do it all — with full support for:

• Instagram and Facebook visits
• X (formerly Twitter) follows, tweets, and retweets
• Email subscriptions
• User-generated photos and videos
• Peer-to-peer sharing for bonus entries

Use a unique link in your Instagram bio to send users to your opt-in contest. You can customise how people enter, what counts as a valid entry, and how the winner is randomly selected.

You can even embed a free tool like a random name picker or live contest countdown to increase urgency and participation.