This morning I was intrigued by a sticker on my Eight O’clock coffee package announcing I could win one million dollars or other prizes. I checked the website listed in the package and learned that the only way to participate in the sweepstakes was to “Like” the Eight O’clock brand on Facebook.
Brand recognition is such an important asset to business that even after regulations impeded companies from requiring consumers to purchase their products to participate in sweepstakes, they continued these contests without the requirement for their products being purchased at all.
My Facebook account is a very public profile of who I am and it is just as important to my personal brand as a corporate brand is to the Eight O’clock Coffee Company. So I abandoned the idea of participating in their sweepstakes all together. I have their product in my house, and their coffee is fine, but there is nothing about it that makes me leap out of my chair to applaud it.
In other words, I have no compelling reason to criticize their product, but I will also not praise them undeservedly so I will have a chance to win a free coffee maker. My very public personal brand on Facebook is much more valuable than any free prizes I may receive.