Congratulations! You lose

OK, so apparently I’ve won.

To claim my prize – I still don’t know what it is – all I need to do now is SMS a code and by doing so, I subscribe* to Monster Mobile.

Good thing I read the Ts & Cs or I probably would’ve claimed my prize and expected to be charged nothing more than the cost of sending that one-off SMS message. I would have been pretty annoyed with a charge for an unwanted subscription appearing on my mobile bill.

In the interest of imparting a positive brand impression, two fundamentals that Monster – and indeed anyone else running a promo or comp – should apply, include:

1.       Make it easy to enter and be clear about what the commitments of entering are
2.       Let the experience or the result of entering be of value, not cost, to entrants.

Because Monster hasn’t done this, their promo feels less like a competition and more like intended trickery, for their short-term gain.

Moreover, the card was inserted in 9TO5 mag and from there, I hardly believe Monster ever expected to find core mobile gamers who might genuinely be interested in subscribing to a mobile game service.

Monster needs to very clearly convey the obligation to subscribe in the main body of copy, rather than in the fine print. Otherwise they’ll be answering calls from once oblivious and now irate customers who never wanted to be customers in the first place.

* This is a subscription service at a cost of $10 every 5 days. To opt out at any time text STOP. Standard SMS service provider fees apply.