“The Zone” Changes Contest Rules, Deceives Listeners
KZZO-FM, known on-air as “100.5 The Zone” has been running a contest for close to a week now in which an unknown “Outlaw” allegedly stole $25,000 in cash out of a remote broadcast van. The station promised a reward of $25,000 to any individual who asked the correct person a specific question.
Sounds like a great win, especially since a multi-market CBS Radio contest is only awarding $10,000. Yeah, sounds great…until you read the fine print.
That’s exactly what local blogger Sacramento Republicrat did. Like many others, it was soon discovered that The Zone was not offering $25,000 right away—but instead a much smaller prize of $3,440 in the form of a share certificate that would accrue interest over 10 years. This means the lucky winner to unmask the Outlaw would have to wait until 2018 to collect on their twenty-five grand.
After reading the rules, outraged listeners took to Internet message boards like Craigslist.org to express their anger at the deception of a local radio station. Rather than apologize to upset listeners, The Zone quickly backpedaled and rewrote contest rules to reflect an accurate prize of $25,000 cash in a dubious attempt to spin the ordeal into a positive marketing ploy.
Calls to The Zone were disconnected twice Tuesday afternoon, but someone claiming to be the 100.5 The Zone’s $25,000 “Outlaw” commented on a post left here at RadioMatthew.com Tuesday evening, attacking one of the readers of this blog and trashing a rival Sacramento alternative radio station.
“It is $25,000 CASH. Always was, always will be,” said the person claiming to be the “Outlaw”. “Theater of the mind requires trickery, and that will include legal rules in this internet age.” Trickery that involves leaking fake rules? “The Zone sent that out to get someone to bite it, and (KDND 107.9FM) The End did,” the “Outlaw” went on to say in reference to The End’s morning show devoting an entire hour of discussion to The Zone’s contest.
Makes sense. Deceive your listeners and kill your honest reputation in order to gain press. Makes you wonder if there are any hidden strings or false rules attached to other Zone contests. Will the winner of the concert tickets to see guitarist John Mayer actually win passes to see the photographer from Diff’rent Strokes? Will the winner of the family pack of movies to Cinemark Cinemas, which expressly state that the passes can be used for “any movie” at “any time” be restricted to G or PG “family-friendly” movies?
Sounds absurd, but in this “do-anything” world where radio stations can hop online and change contest rules—then spin it as a publicity stunt and attack people online instead of apologizing to listeners who feel deceived—it could very well happen.
“All press is good press, and The Zone got tons of new listeners today.” As KSAC found before flipping formats, it’s not the listeners—but instead, the advertisers—who can make or break a station. The future will decide if advertisers wish to run on a station that is deceptive and dishonest toward its listeners in station contests.
In my past life, I was a tree or something. If not a tree, something that grew old and didn't move very much. I'm pretty convinced of this.