BUT WAIT, THERE'S "MORE"!

I revisited the Home Depot YouTube contest page to see if anything might have been posted since last I checked. There were no discussion groups, but this graph caught my eye.



I don't recall the text that Home Depot purposefully posted in bold being part of the original feedback instructions, and the emphasis seemed unusually over-explanatory. I'll have to do some more research on historical versions of the site. Why take the time to add "more than one week after the contest ends"? Wouldn't someone typically say "Discussion Forums will be closed on 12/26/07" and leave it at that? It feels a bit like Home Depot felt the need to go the extra mile and justify their decision to shut down all the message boards. Is this another "after-the-fact" explanation as to their actions, similar to their "after-the-contest" explanation that they will allow their chosen video to re-edit to meet contest rules? My guess is that they couldn't take the heat from the posts that were questioning the contest's outcome. What do you think? I want to be proven wrong, so if you have any information contradicting this, please let me know, and I'll post an update.

ONE OF 2007'S "MOST HATED COMPANIES"

Be sure to scroll down to get up-to-date on all the controversy surrounding Home Depot's $25,000 YouTube contest, in which they allowed the winning video to re-edit their entry AFTER the contest was over, in order to meet their own contest rules.

If you scroll down down far enough, you'll read the post regarding IMRE Communications getting involved in this promotional contest. This was their first time operating a YouTube contest, but not the first time they have been hired by Home Depot. Home Depot has had a tough time with their company image, noted especially by the AOL Money and Finance poll that, with over 200,000 votes, pegged Home Depot as one of the most hated companies in for 2007. (More analysis here) Given that dubious title, and because this YouTube contest was all about promoting their Gift Cards and building their brand, you would think this would trigger extra safeguards to ensure they conduct their promotions with the utmost in accuracy and response to all the contest entrants. It would appear that wasn't the case.

I'm interested in seeing how Home Depot has portrayed this contest results, since they haven't said a peep about it on the YouTube site that I am aware of. If anyone is aware of official press releases given by Home Depot regarding this contest, and how they presented it to the media, please let me know. Maybe we'll luck out and Manish Shrivastava, President, Home Depot Incentives will stop by and let us know.

For reference, here's the Press Release they published when the contest was underway.

COMMENTS RE-STARTED

After a brief down in the comments section, I have re-activated comments here. I am hoping there will be more civility this time. Please try to stick to the contest issues. Enjoy.

A COMMENT ON COMMENTS

Happy New Year! If you haven't done so already, I strongly encourage you to scroll down to catch all the posts regarding Home Depot's $25,000 YouTube Contest, and how they allowed the winning video to re-edit AFTER the contest to remove shots that should have disqualified them according to contest rules. I've reposted the video comparison below, since it can get lost in the threads. The bottom-most post will fill you in on many details.

Note to all: For the time being, I have shut down comments to posts here, since some visitors went on a comment binge and simply couldn't maintain a civilized discussion about the contest itself, going so far as to try to impersonate me. However, as always, your e-mails are welcome (just click on the profile to the right).

Speaking of e-mails, this from a reader:

I was just reading about this Hannah Montana contest: I know the circumstances are different. The winner of this one purposely lied. But I couldn't help thinking that if Home Depot was in charge of this contest they would have just let the lady rewrite her essay to make minor changes...like removing the part about her dad being killed in Iraq. Can you imagine how pissed off people would have been if that happened?

Therein lies one objective of this blog... to find answers and keep this from happening again by Home Depot or anyone else. Sadly, I have yet to receive any information to disprove the bulk of my observations. To their credit, the organizers of the Hannah Montana contest did not award the prize to the entrant when this information was discovered (quoting from MSNBC).

"After awarding the grand prize, we unfortunately learned that the statements made in the essay were untrue," she said in the statement. "Club Libby Lu greatly values honestly and integrity. In order to uphold these values, we have decided to withdraw the award initially given to the Ceballos family."

But to add to the reader's quote above, I would gather from what I've read, there are already plenty of "pissed off people" in this $25,000 scenario.

And then there's this e-mail from another reader in support of Home Depot's actions:

While I am one who appreciates a good public forum debate on issues pertainant to you me and those around us, please do not forget that we are dealing with a family of four-the Longs-who work hard everyday and, contrary to what some opponants have written, will certainly value a $25000 gift certificate to make renovations to their home.

This has been stated numerous times, but just to clarify, this blog is in no way intended as some sort of crusade against the Long family (who created the winning video). This blog is intended to address what could be described as "insider influence" in determining the contest outcome, and the process of legally adhering to Home Depot's own contest rules. As Home Depot has said, it would be unfair to the 260 other entrants not to do so. Ultimately, Home Depot/IMRE Communications are responsible for the outcome of the contest and the legal application of the rules.