The age old lure of fame and money is what Fever FM's Mumbai station used as bait in its recently concluded Vodafone Fever Contest. Listeners stood to win a sum of Rs 104,000 every 104 minutes (in keeping with the station's frequency) as a part of the contest. The strategy worked. Fever claims to have got the city in a sweat with an overwhelming response to this summer venture.Mercury rising

Fever Mumbai, that's been the most reticent amid the cacophony of FM players in the market in the metropolis, decided the summer vacation was a good time to get the youth waking up to the station. Says Fever's National Marketing and Promotions Head Gowri Satyamoorthy Kapre, "The whole idea of the contest was to have a lot more people tune into the station."

The station that faced transmission problems earlier, decided to go for the jugular. "With an improvement in transmission in March, we are expecting to reach out to a lot more people now," Kapre said while the campaign was still on air. The venture was kickstarted on a grand scale to announce its arrival and to step up the station's sampling by offering an engaging and entertaining on-air experience to the listeners.Vodafone Mumbai Essar CEO Naveen Chopra says, "The Vodafone Fever contest is an enjoyable and fun filled contest open to all residents of Mumbai. The Vodafone Fever is bound to catch on, with listeners standing to gain a daily prize of Rs. 1.04 lakhs."

Partners in frenzy

Vodafone, on its part, left no stone unturned to build an advantage for its customers and created special value ads. Vodafone users stood a chance to win Rs 2,08,000. "This is a promotion in partnership with Vodafone and we have developed a unique mechanism, wherein if a participant has a particular Vodafone caller tune on his/her mobile, he/she stands to double the prize monies" says Kapre.

According to Chopra, "The contest has been primarily done with an objective to connect with our customers. We have also used this as a platform to give our customers the Vodafone Advantage. The contest is our first large format radio activity in Mumbai."Cure for the Fever

Registrations for the contest carried on for a week before it finally began on 14 April. Selected contestants stood a chance to win the bounty - all they needed to do is answer the phone by saying `Vodafone Fever'.

Promo Fever

Promotional activities in terms of contest awareness were also rolled out. "Large scale listener focused promotions are a part of Fever's strategy", avers Kapre. On-ground promotions at malls like Inorbit and Shopper's Stop in the suburbs and Phoenix Mills in central Mumbai specially on weekends were scheduled to complement the on-air campaign. Additionally, print campaigns as well as outdoor campaigns including hoardings and billboards at various locations in the city were also pressed into service.

As a partner, Vodafone was also actively involved in promoting the contest. As Chopra says, "We have undertaken Fever Point of Sale in the Retail Market, Vodafone Stores, Bill Envelopes and Print ads. In fact, we have actively been pushing it out through all our touch points."Temperature soaring high with response

According to Fever, the campaign received an overwhelming response of almost a million entries. As Kapre said while the campaign was on, "We are still not over with the contest...but we make nearly 10 calls every day, starting from 14 April." With the overwhelming response, the station expects a lot more people to tune into the station after the contest.

The contest witnessed a total of 53 winners

One of the contest winners, Nikita Dewatwal, a 17 year old student of Ruia College is obviously extremely happy with the booty won. "I really don't know what to say. I'm really excited. How many 17 year olds win so much money," says an overwhelmed Nikita.

Vodafone is also extremely happy with the success that the campaign has garnered. "Fever as a channel has mastered the art of large format promotional campaigns on radio and due to this expertise we were confident that they will manage to garner great success with this campaign too", says Chopra.The returnsBoth Fever and Vodafone expect a good return from the contest, in terms of increasing customer base and brand building. Fever has come up with such cash-bait schemes earlier (Bingo Tick Tock in September 2007) also which has worked well for the station.

In Delhi, Fever has been cashing in on the IPL fever (Daredevils Deewangee).

The tried and tested cash carrot seems to be working well for the station.