In the last few days, a competition with free tickets to Europa Park caused quite a stir on Facebook.
We have discussed this fake competition several times and also shown what is behind it and how it works. Knowledge of the processes is particularly important here, because these types of fake competitions occur all the time, only the supposed winnings vary.
That's why we keep reporting on dubious competitions that always follow the same pattern and where there are never any winners. Facebook users are attracted with high-quality prizes. To ensure that these status reports about the competitions go viral, there are special tricks with which the reports receive a lot of interaction and are therefore shown to many people. The classic here: Facebook users are encouraged to like, share and comment on content. It's easy to claim that these processes are necessary to win.
How do I recognize such competitions?
However, it is also quite easy to uncover these types of competitions. You can recognize ominous competitions when you read, for example: “Press like and you’ll get into our lottery pot!” and “Whoever shares the post has a double chance!” and then “The page –name-of-the-page- must be liked!
Another characteristic is when the following content is NOT AVAILABLE:
Owner of the site / contact person
Imprint
Contact option
Conditions of participation
Exemption from Facebook
Reputable companies deal with the topic of competitions on Facebook and present them correctly. Among other things, reputable organizers ensure that an imprint, a contact and conditions of participation are available, which are also necessary from a legal perspective.
Extended checklist:
Users are forced to “like” and “share”.
There is no (credible) imprint.
No conditions of participation.
No contact option.
No correct company available.
Page has only existed for a very short time.
No winners will be announced. Prizes are provided by sponsors who “do not wish to be named.”
The prizes are advertised with copied images from the Internet.
For well-known companies, look for the blue verification check mark behind the page name in the cover photo.
Ultimately, fake competitions have one thing in common: they run on three levels, which make it possible to see what they're really about. Because fake competitions, which have a strong virality, are a business model. In contrast to real competitions that are organized by companies for advertising purposes, fake competition organizers use the product as a decoy.
3 steps
The first step is the bait. This bait usually appears in the form of a status message on Facebook, a WhatsApp message or, in rare cases, an Instagram message. These baits are all identical in nature: they convey the prospect of a win that you essentially already have in your pocket. With the ease of participation, they entice you to take part and lure you to a website. This is the bait . The bait is the viral entry into the competition process.
Step two is usually a website that pretends to be a competition with a question and answer session. This round of questions is not necessarily always present because, on the one hand, it is irrelevant and is only intended to simulate the character of a competition. We also call this step two the bridge . The bridge takes the form of a fake competition. In this bridge, you are usually promised a prize directly, deception is used and fake elements are used. Ultimately, this bridge is also an illegal component because the promises made are not kept and the structure and presentation uses protected graphic elements. The corporate design of existing companies and their products are mercilessly exploited; on the bridge people also like to pretend to be the company depicted. Goal of the bridge:
a) Generate virality (example: forward this competition to 20 contacts).
b) A link is installed that should lead to the supposed prize.
The third and final step is a so-called affiliate program. You leave the bridge via a link that contains an affiliate code that belongs to a commission program. This is an affiliate whose content, if possible, correlates with the fake competition taking place in the bridge. We call this final link the exit. Note: The exit itself, i.e. the affiliates that are linked to, is not illegal! These are business models in which the respective provider of such programs compensates its sales partners through commissions. These sales partners are recognized by the provider through an identification code, so that every newly registered participant in the affiliate competition can also be assigned to the sales partner. By the way, the person who designs the bridge freely decides which partner program he uses as an exit. We also often find systems that read the participant's origin and device information and thus direct them specifically to different commission programs. Therefore, you can never say clearly which commission program will ultimately be used; in the worst case, you will end up with dubious WAP billing stories or opaque subscription services.
The fake counts!
Therefore, the author of Bait and Bridge, who is also likely to be the respective sales partner of the affiliate provider, has a great interest in ensuring that his fake story sounds as credible as possible in advance, but at the same time also has a high potential for virality.
A good lie is therefore half the battle when it comes to fake news and fake competitions.
Notes:
1) This content reflects the current state of affairs at the time of publication. The reproduction of individual images, screenshots, embeds or video sequences serves to discuss the topic. 2) Individual contributions were created through the use of machine assistance and were carefully checked by the Mimikama editorial team before publication. ( Reason )