Prize promotions, if run correctly, can be a great marketing tool for increased sales and brand awareness. It's therefore no surprise that they are used by brands in all sectors. However, if done in haste, or the promoter overpromises and underdelivers, the potential for good publicity can quickly turn into irks, complaints and bad publicity. Two recent upheld rulings by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) regarding prize promotions gone wrong can be a useful lesson to brands and marketers alike.

Lipstick Lottery

The ASA has published a ruling against Space NK, a cosmetics retailer, who on 13th September 2023, announced a competition via an Instagram post. To enter, participants had to: 

• Follow Space NK;
• Comment a present emoji;
• Tag three friends, and;
• Get 0 likes on their comments.

Participants could also gain two bonus entries by sharing the post via Instagram story. 

The ASA launched an investigation following a complaint from a member of the public, who challenged whether (a) the prize was awarded in accordance with laws of chance and (b) administered fairly. The ASA issued its own challenge as to whether the brand omitted significant conditions of the promotion. 

Space NK's response

Space NK stated that to select the winner, their social media manager manually reviewed all comments on the Instagram post and shortlisted the eligible usernames. Space NK then checked direct messages to check whether the brand had been mentioned in the participant's story before allocating two bonus entries. All entries were added to an online random generator from which a winner was selected. 

With regards to the significant terms, Space NK denied the allegation and said that consumers would understand the phrase “terms and conditions apply” to mean that full terms can be found on its website. 

Glossing Over the Rejection

The ASA upheld all three challenges. 

It said that Space NK fell on the wrong side of the CAP Code by:

• failing to provide evidence which demonstrated that all valid entries at the time the promotion closed had been included;
• failing to demonstrate that the review excluded entries that were liked after the draw closed but before the list of valid entries was compiled; and
• potentially enabling bonus points to participants who had not met the full requirements for them. Space NK were able to see that they were mentioned via direct messages, but they could not verify the post that they were mentioned in. 

With regards to omitting significant terms, the ASA considered Space NK's failure to mention the draw's starting and closing dates, as well as the possibility of multiple entries, as significant omissions likely to mislead consumers. 

Take-home

The idea for a valid comment entry to accrue 0 likes is brilliant. It engages users and whilst it reduces the number of participants, the likes gained improve the social media algorithm in the brand's favour. Regarding the tag in the Instagram story, the platform's limited functionalities can seem to make this ruling harsh. However, what we can learn from here is that no matter how creative the idea, fair administration of prize promotions is a high bar and limits to social media functionalities will not work in promoter's favour. 

Another take home is that brands and promoters must store evidence to demonstrate that their prize promotion complies with the rules. This is partly how Space NK failed to satisfy the ASA. 

In a prize-promotion double whammy, ASA's upheld ruling against the Witcombe Festival drives this point further. The prize was a backstage visit and the ASA said that the Witcombe Festival should not have offered the VIP backstage experience if they could not guarantee they could fulfil the prize at the time of the event because artists could refuse members of the public from going backstage. The complainant alleged failure to award the prize as described and the Festival organisers failed to show the ASA evidence that they had made a verbal offer of a reasonable equivalent. It's the little things that can catch you!