Maybe I am not the target consumer but having done my fair share of rounds at BCLB, I do know a thing or two about what it takes to get that receipt…aka your license. I chanced on an advert in the Daily Nation on Friday May 28 that drew my attention but it seems for all the wrong reasons. Here’s why I think something is amiss with this particular promotion.

1.Who is behind the promotion

With all promotions, it must be crystal clear who is running the promotion, the terms and conditions and most importantly a customer service number that one can call in-case of any enquiries. Apart from it being “funny” that you would put two adverts pushing the same service on the same page, I did try to call call the said number severally only to disconnected without as much as a ring. A  faint logo that reads Flint Ltd can be seen at the bottom left, and one is directed to go to the website for terms and conditions, which are in flash format which doesn’t lend itself well to printing for future reference and or proof in-case of any complaints. The contact link on the website doesn’t reveal physical location or other telephone or mobile number that once can call, instead it gives a “mail to”script which again we all know how many chaps…read as zero, will have outlook configured on the machines they may attempt to view the terms and conditions from. You could always argue that you can open your email and send in your enquiry…but again.So who is behind the “promotion” ?

Update – Sunday 30, 2010 as appeared on the Nation – http://bit.ly/9hSVGD

The Range Rover Sport that is to be won

Software firm Flint Limited has signed an agreement with Nation Media Group to use the media house’s outlets to support its forthcoming SMS-based quiz promotion.

The quiz dubbed Shinda Smart Sh90 million in 90 days starts on June.In each of the 90 days, there will be one winner pocketing Sh500,000.

The victor will be announced daily on NTV before 1p.m. news.There would also be Sh1 million to be won weekly for 13 weeks and Sh5 million every month for three months.“As a grand prize, we will give away further Sh10 million in cash and a Range Rover on August 30, 2010,” Flint project manager Victoria Ombogo said at Nation Centre.

The car is worth over Sh14 million, she said.To participate, one needs to SMS their name, from any mobile network to 6969.They would then get a question, which they have to answer and send back to get into the competition.

Nation Newspapers Division managing director Tom Mshindi thanked Flint for choosing to promote the competition through Nation Media Group.“We are delighted you found it fit to work with us,” he said. “It is a clear indication of the good work we do because in any single day we reach over 90 per cent of Kenyans through our communication platforms.”

Flint director Asenath Wacera said that NMG gives her company an opportunity to get through to more Kenyans.“We are glad about this partnership because through the infrastructure that Nation has we will reach as many Kenyans as possible.”

Flint also put their website live and their contact info is:

FLINT LTD8th Floor, Office #1
5th Avenue Building,
5th Ngong Avenue & Ngong Road
Upper Hill Nairobi, Kenya

2. A promotion is supposed to move a product and/or service

I have read up on the promotion and even gone online where the url – shindasmart.com redirects to  – http://90millionin90days.com. Unless, I missed it I cannot see what product or service is being promoted and as such it could very well be classified as a fundraiser since clearly…

Update: Sunday30th May 2010:

Flint is a software company, so the spin would be promoting their quiz service.

3. User experience

Its confusing to a potential participant what they are paying for and how that split is being done. Every sms earns you a minimum of 20 points…is there a time an sms will earn me 100 points?  The grammar is wanting as well a snippet reads “The more entries you have, the more times your name into: ” And what is this “view it like a bulk discount for your entry vibe?” Sheeesh!

4. Misleading

The advert goes ahead to state Never Before, 1 sms enters you in seven ca$h draws. Win ALL 7 or anyone of them. Drive away in your own Range Rover Sport 2010. However the terms and conditions state that to participate I the daily draws you must send have at least registered for participation that day or sent one sms that day…meaning yesterdays entry doesn’t count for today. It also states in 3.5 a daily winner cannot participate to win another daily prize, a weekly winner cannot participate to win another weekly prize, a monthly winner cant participate to win another monthly prize and a grand prize winner cannot participate to win the other grand prize. So how can you WIN ALL 7 even if lady luck smiled on you? You can only win a maximum of 4 prizes – 1 daily, 1, weekly, 1 monthly and 1 grand

5. Quality of artwork and presentation

For a promotion that’s giving away Ksh 90million in 90 days, the ad is poorly done. It’s 90 million for crying out loud…and its a Range Rover Sport 2010. There’s no visualization of the cash (dont think using pictures of cash is legal, unless you get some sort of clearance) or the ubber sexy Range Rover Sport 2010 that would in my mind be the stuff that would make guys drool. Have you seen the Omo advert with Churchill playing with the one of the 25 cars in the giveaway?That would be more like it..then again this is just me…

7. The pricing

The cost of participation needs to have justifiable value viz a viz the content on offer. The pricing model here seems to be purely ching ching driven…60 bob to answer one question? Memories of those blonde game shows that used to air on tv and use IVR as a carrier come to mind. They raked in quite the sum in their time but left behind angry consumers and made the 0900 distasteful to the consumer, who every-time they see an 0900 number, they go …RIP OFF!

7. The terms and conditions smell

On the same paper, the Daily Nation Friday May 28th 2010, on page 41…right at the bottom is the T&C for the promotion…and i have major beef with it.

Here’s why:-

Part 1: Daily prize – up to 500,000 shillings in cash to be distributed daily for a total of 90 days . Here is the clincher - Daily prize is guaranteed by the organizer to the value of Ksh 1,000 and is thereafter sales dependent.

What is read like for me, and my wakili friends can verify this for me: Hey damn ass, we know you want to get rich quick, but really we are just hoodwinking you. If we don’t get enough guys to send us sms which we will bill them 60 bob each time, them we will only give out 1,000 bob every day…none of this 500k stuff we are plastering all over our advert. That’s why we can only guarantee Ksh. 1,000 daily and the rest depends on how many of you guys participate.Hope my print is small enough and you don’t get to read it

The story is the same for the Weekly prize where only you can win upto Ksh 1,000,000 but only Ksh 5,000 is guaranteed and the rest is sales dependent, for the Monthly prize – up to Ksh 5,000,000 but only Ksh 10,000 guaranteed by organizer and the rest…(please finish for me). For GRAND PRIZE ONE – upto Ksh 10,000,000 and only Ksh 100,000 is guaranteed. The Range Rover Sport 2010 is apparently parked at Westgate, haven’t quite verified this though.

What this ends up looking like is fraud…as per my understanding, of you are running a promotion of any sort, the prizes must be verified as being in actual existence buy way of purchase receipt and physical confirmation of goods. At no point in time is the giving of advertised prizes supposed to be dependent on sales and or activations.

For example: CocaCola have been running the Utadunda na Nani Promotion where they are giving away 2 tickets a day. You have to consume their product or hand around near where their product has been consumed to get hold of a bottle-top where you get an 8 digit code that you send in to a shortcode to enter the draws. The more product you consume or the longer you hang out at your local kiosk  the higher your chances of winning. Heres the thing, you wont see dodgy statements like…2 tickets to be won daily for 30 days,[begin fine print] only 14 tickets guaranteed, the rest depends on how much Coke you Kenyans drink and sms the 8 digits [end fine print]. No crap like that…but clearly this is what this 90 million in 90 days promotion seems to say.

Thing is…it will hurt legit promotions as the consumer is increasingly discerning and will develop a distaste for such in the future, if they feel that they are being duped. The chaps have right of reply but they must also give full disclosure to allow the public to understand what they are about…the fine print stinks

Ooooh! and if your a moneymatics guy, here’s why the model that’s been adopted is lucrative,while yet uncertain. If media and advertising is no issue and you managed to engage 200,000 kenyans daily for 90days, the numbers would work out something close to this.

Premium Billed – Ksh 60

Less VAT Net left to share btw organizer and network – Ksh 51.7

Since it is billed on mobile origination, if you don’t have credit then it wont go through and a such I assume the 50,000 person per day engagement is billed

Therefore you would work with – 200,000 x ksh 51.7 x 90 days= Ksh.930,600,000.00

Operators give better revenue share on high volumes so they may take  30% – 40%  on such traffic, even 20% if your really good.

If its the 20% the operator takes and organiser sits with 80%, their net income would come to – Ksh.744,480,000.00, with a very chunky and lovely profit after the Ksh 90 million + additional advertising spend deductions. Oh, all lotteries need to pay out a certain sum to a charity or the other. I see no mention of this in the T&C’s.

May look like easy money, but Kenyans are peculiar and not only that…by the books you would need to have the 90million + available before hand to begin with, and that’s not exactly pocket change.

Lets see how this goes.

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