Sophie Chambers, Director at Cloud Nine Incentives, explains how a positive prize winning experience can ensure consumers brand loyalty and positive brand reputation. 

‘I’ve never won anything before’, is one of the most commonly exclaimed sentences from prize winners! And it’s one that I also had the good fortune to find myself saying late last year when I won a fabulous luxury weekend break to Scotland.

Having worked in the prize and incentives industry for over 15 years, I have notified thousands of unsuspecting competition winners of the fantastic news that they are indeed the lucky winner, and so can vouch that the majority will utter the very words, “I’ve never won anything before”!  For that reason it’s the best part of the job for me, no matter what scale the prize; around the world trips, meet and greets with celebrities or a free cinema voucher, this gift can brighten up someone’s otherwise mundane day or even change their life.

As director of Cloud Nine Incentives, I am proud to have built a team centred around excellent prize winner management and, following my own experience, is why it’s a service I believe the industry needs to give equal (or arguably more) importance to than the promotion itself.

Last May I stumbled across a promo for a soft drinks brand to win a 5* trip to Scotland that featured in an online food magazine. It was a simple entry process so I clicked through, entered my details and to be honest forgot all about it as I too have never won anything before!  That was until I received a call to inform me that I had won the holiday. I was thrilled, as well as intrigued to experience prize winning from the ‘other side’.

Being the prize winner is an exciting time and should feel like a seamless VIP experience. Even for a free cinema voucher, the winner has bothered to engage with the brand so the least they deserve is to receive the prize on time. My own winner journey was not seamless and I certainly didn’t feel like a VIP. For weeks I was passed between marketing and PR agencies to provide simple details of my Scottish holiday, then fed lies about the whereabouts of my holiday voucher and ultimately I felt like a nuisance for chasing it up. I eventually booked the trip and thanks to excellent hotel and staff, enjoyed a lovely stay and will most certainly be returning. However my view of the brand that facilitated the promo is now negative, not helped with the poor initial communications but also with no effort of brand experience on the trip, a missed opportunity for longer term brand loyalty.

People today are quick to share their negative reviews online for their friends, family and the entire world to read! It’s not worth the risk. On the flip side, I’ve seen first-hand what a positive experience can do for a brand.  Last year we were lucky enough to manage an overseas meet and greet with a high-profile footballer.  The promo was fast moving and the logistics fluid, but my team recognised the importance of hand holding the winners through the whole process as well as guiding them on the ground brand building experiences. The positive social reach and engagement was significant with subtle brand association peppered throughout the winners’ posts. The client was thrilled with so much earned social activity and now understands the value of both protecting their promotional investment and a happy prize winner. Happy winners equals a lot of free PR!

At Cloud Nine Incentives we know that by offering our clients a dedicated prize winner account manager we not only spare any potential embarrassment to the brand but also create magical memories that ensures you have brand loyalty forever.

If you would like to find out how Cloud Nine can help you, get in touch with Sophie Chambers at sophiec@uponcloudnine.co.uk

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62 winners have been selected in this year’s IMC European Awards for Integrated Marketing Communications, representing 29 agencies from 7 countries. Czech Republic and Ireland took the lead with 17 trophies each, followed by Italy with 9, Spain and Belgium with 6 each, United Kingdom 5 and Germany 2.

Outstanding winners are Momentum Czech Republic with a total of 6 awards – 3 for Raffaello against Loneliness, 2 for How Czechs started buying quality food each and 1 for Packaging does sell and Guns or Knives from Ireland with a total of 7 awards – 4 for A Song for the City and 3 for Click & Gone.

The Grand Prix for an exceptional work was presented to Guns or Knives for their campaign A Song for the City for Samsung Ireland. Their amazing idea to transform the Samuel Beckett Bridge into a playable instrument – not only via the Note8’s interface, but also through an actual electric harp created a huge awareness for the new Galaxy Note8.

The UK winners are Sense for Wrap Up London, TracyLocke for Ferrero Rocher: Behind the Layers and ZEAL Creative for KITKAT Personalised Packs.

Click here to view the full list of winners.

IMCC Chairman, Ondrej Gottwald, said, “I am glad to say that this year’s quality of entries was extremely high! Beside the commercial campaigns, I’ve been always a proponent of campaigns with a positive social impact and to see these campaigns being recognised and rewarded by industry professionals is very satisfying. I would like to thank the jury for the excellent and professional voluntary work from them.”

According to IMC European Awards Chair, Renate Vogt, “All cases entered in the competition were of high quality and very well-presented, so the judges had a tough job to come to the final decisions. All nominated cases are fine examples for the industry and our business.”

The winning agencies were selected after two rounds of judging in a European competition of the best campaigns selected at the national level across Europe. The first-round selection was made by a jury panel made up of 40 leading industry professionals across Europe. The second-round jury, comprised of IMCC Council member representatives, took place in Brussels on 27 September. All entries and judging procedures were managed via the official website at www.imcceurope.com.

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