I wanted to share an interesting facet of marketing which I came across. Recently, such types of freebies or giveaways are a rage in e-commerce websites. So what I am talking about exactly..
A few days back a company announced that they would be giving away a FREE latest smart phone from a reputed manufacturer. The only thing they need is YOUR participation (Read as your data)
Now how does this work.
The website collects your data. They mine the data and probably use it in their marketing efforts. The computer then picks a winner randomly out of several thousands of name. And that person is declared a winner.
Now this is when things go haywire for the company. They post and upload the details of the winner and all of a sudden, every loyal customer turns into a professional CID agent. Some of the comments which come up are:
- Fake there is no profile with this name Fake man u guyz r fake
- yes he do work in XYZ Company, he is my friend. i know him. XYZ company is a fake.
- THey started this Deals bcos….. ab XYZ company k paas se koi chappal kharidne k orders b nahi aate so yeh aise stunt marte rehte hai..
- i had been a regular buyer from XYZ company.. bt after seeing this.. sorry XYZ.. you have lost a loyal customer..
Unless the PR of the company is very strong, they cannot justify and defend the number of posts that come up as complaints, scams or allegations of other similar issues. This in turn affects the reputation of the company seriously.
So to round it up, a company spends 40K and gives away the prize to one single customer (Assuming the allegations are false) and what did they create out of this?
Some buzz, 1 loyal customer, Hundreds of angry lost customers who do not believe in the random function of the computers.
What should the company actually do to prevent all this?
The company should change their strategy to invest the money to gift loyal customers or new customers with discount coupons. I have taken part in small contests where they had given Rs. 100 vouchers and although the money seemed small, I was excited to win the contest and then purchase the products directly from the company. This small amount had led me to generate some couple of thousands in revenues to the company.
The companies and their hardcore supporters would say that you didn’t spend anything. And you didn’t get anything. So why are you disappointed? Its just a game of luck..
The common man would reply, “Then why did you instill hope into our minds?” The minds then finds a reason to blame for their bad luck, which generally takes form of allegations of company being fake.
Giving away freebies is nice, but the inherent anger and jealousy generated by those who couldn’t grab the freebie is more than the pleasure of a single customer.
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The author of this blog post is not responsible for damaging the reputation of any e-commerce companies or hurting the ego of those who didn’t get the freebie. This was just a thought he came across, while sitting lazily on his laptop on a lazy holiday morning.
An aspiring rodinhood’er, who has mastered the ‘thinking’ part, yet missing out on the ‘doing’ part. 😉