On our most recent project, we held an online giveaway where the first 100 entrants would win a free bag of coffee. In designing the signup form, I really wanted to present the user with a nice visual counter that would show the user exactly how many samples were still up for grabs. Nothing spurs users into action more then a deal that’s going to expire, and nothing gives users more confidence than knowing that they aren’t the only ones that have signed up. The success of this philosophy can clearly be seen on sites like Groupon. So I set off building a nice countdown graphic drawing inspiration from my cars odometer, analogue clocks and retro webpage hit-counters.

Once I had my graphic designed, I thought I’d invoke a little jQuery to give it some pizzaz. I banged out the script in a few minutes and it was good to go. We launched the site, hit Facebook, Twitter and the Aurora Importing blog and waited for the traffic to roll in.

It took some time for us to get our first sign ups. In fact on the first day, the form sat completely untouched. If we were to run this contest again, I think I would avoid starting off the contest at an even number. When you see “100 samples available”, people tend to assume the counter is simply non functional, rather than believe they are actually the first person to sign up. It’s also scary being the first person through the door. What if you get ripped off? What if you’re the only one that falls for it?

On day two John did some digging and found some interesting forums, twitter accounts and deal websites to mention the contest too. Not long after I started seeing the counter tick down to zero, a within about an hour and a half, it was all over!

I had a look at my jQuery code, and seeing that rest of the week wasn’t looking to busy, I set off inspired to write my first legit jQuery plugin. I ‘plugged in’ (to borrow a term from “The Social Network”), and before I knew it, it was all done!

If you’ve got a minute, check out flipCounter, BloggingSquared’s first jQuery plugin, and let us know what you think!