Why giving free samples can give you slut status - and what happened to the Westfield shopper blogger?

Do you know who won the Westfield shopper blogger job? Yeah, I say "won" and not "got"... It wasn´t really a job search but rather a massive competition - and it got lots of media exposure, making the 100 000 dollar investment worth it before the blogger had even written a word.

But I just checked the website and there is no blogger to be found... Did they even appoint anyone or was it a scam?

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/be-paid-just-to-go-shopping-westfield-puts-up-100000-shopper-blogger-job/story-e6freuy9-1225929649890

There are sooooo many promotional, experiential, advertising and social media campaigns running at the same time. Millions are pumped out, we are all sprinkled in competitions, giveaways and happenings. But how many do we really notice? Win this and win that - I haven´t entered a contest like that since I was a teenager and wanted a bicycle. Have you?

Is it really effective? I get wowed by the cleverness of campaigns when reading about them in the industry publications, but I´ve never been exposed to one in real life. You can get free samples of all sorts of stuff when wandering Bondi Beach on a Summer Saturday - but I´m not sure I remember which brands I got. Freebies simply pass by un noticed - because they do not involve me. They touch my surface but never grabs my heart.

If you really wish to cut through the clutter that our life is I guess you need to have a smart strategy. Understand your consumers and their emotional needs. Know their footsteps through shopper marketing research. Get them engaged by asking them to participate, play, perform or work for the freebies.

By simply giving away stuff to anyone you act much like the lady in the short skirt, who is stumbeling around on the dance floor at 2.55 am...