What was the competition?As you may know, last week Puma ran a "treasure hunt" competition in which they released a clue to all followers of BeInThatNumber on twitter as to the location of 20 free Spurs shirts between Friday and Tuesday 4pm-6pm each day. To allow fans to get them a week or so before they were available to everyone else. That sounds great you would say. Win win situation for both fans and puma? In theory yes...Puma gets thousands of followers on twitter to contact about future Spurs shirt sales and they drum up excitement about the upcoming shirt release, and Spurs fans get free shirts. But in practice, it didn't work to well....
Why it didn't work.
The timing. 4-6pm on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. So, on Friday, Monday and Tuesday, the competition was run during work hours. Meaning the competition was only really available to the unemployed and people bunking off. Saturday, there was a Spurs away game being played from 3-5pm. So, the "true" fans this was supposedly targeting would be watching the one all draw with West Brom. Leaving Sunday as the only viable day that many (gainfully employed) Spurs fans could take part.
Sunday Shambles...
I had a go Sunday, and it was a shambles. The clue was posted on twitter was "Where's the builder? N170AE". A quick search on google maps showed nothing building related at that postcode. 20 minutes later we got the following post "Sorry post code n178er" A check on google maps and it's obviously The Bricklayers Arms in Tottenham. Off I go to the Bricklayers and there's 2 guys in the corner with a TV camera. I go up to them and they tell me that I'm too late as all the shirts have gone. There's a few people milling around obviously happy they've just won. I spoke to one of them who informed me that she was actually a Liverpool fan who was just going to sell the shirt. When I asked her was she following them on twitter, she didn't have a clue what I was talking about. And they didn't actually get a shirt, they got a little voucher that they had to take to the Puma store in carnaby street on the day of the release to get it. So, not actually a week before everyone else as originally claimed.
It turns out that when two guys with a TV camera walk into a pub, the regulars and people already in there are going to go up and see what's going on, and when they're told free stuff is being given away, they're going to take it. And the 2 guys there were not checking to see if the people approaching them were actually following them on twitter.... or even Spurs fans.
In conclusion
So Puma, I commend you for trying. But I think this has been a bit of a failure and there will be more negative feeling than positive. Perhaps a few things to learn for next time:
-Don't do it just for unemployed londoners.
-Don't do a competition for Spurs fans during Spurs matches.
-Get the location right on twitter.
-Make sure the people claiming the shirts are actually following you on twitter.
-Make sure they're actually Spurs fans.
-Make sure they're actually Spurs fans.
Also...
This is also posted on another one of my blogs. Tottenblog Hotspur - An irreverent look at all things Spurs. Click here to visit it.
