The Scoop on PromotionsProject Support Team Blog

March 23rd, 2009

Damn you Ed McMahon! Some thoughts on winner trust and passed-upon prizes

Pssst! Hey you: want a 52″ LCD TV? we’ve got three of them that we’re aching to give away. How about an iPod Nano? Color printer? Weekend trip to a Division 1 College Game (complete with tailgate experience)? There’s a closetful of prizes that we cannot give away simply because people won’t respond to our winner notifications - whether it comes by phone, snail-mail or email.When it comes to this sort of thing, people are skeptical and mistrustful by default. And with good reason - each week scores of spam emails find their way into our inboxes. Over the years we’ve all received mountains of Ed McMahon-branded Publisher’s Clearinghouse letters - “John Doe may already have won our Level 1 prize of $15 million…” And Do Not Call lists be damned, courtesy callers still find cause to interrupt our Sunday evenings.

But the game has changed. Blatantly deceptive messaging is all but illegal in most places. If you have entered a sweepstakes or contest recently, you owe it to yourself to at least consider speaking to that “unknown” caller. Or perhaps answering that suspicious-looking but enticing email. Does the name of the promotion ring a bell? Ask for a toll-free number so you can speak to an actual human being. Get the name of the promotion’s sponsor, and demand to see the official rules. You can even ask for the date your winning entry was received and the exact steps you took to enter.

Exercise caution, of course, but don’t rule out the fact that this may in fact be your lucky day. Take it from us - people really DO win.