Alltel Runs ‘Pick & Roll’ College Basketball Play
Alltel Wireless is looking to score points with college basketball fans through a contest to pick winning teams in a slate of select games each week on fanu.com, a news and social networking site.
Alltel’s relationship with the new college sports Web site sparked the My Circle Pick & Roll Challenge contest, which offers a grand prize of a $100,000 “salary” as the Chief Basketball Officer of Fans and a weekend of jet-setting to major college basketball tournaments.
The contest at http://www.fanu.com/alltel will winnow competitors down to the highest-scoring trio trying to pick 10 winners weekly over five weeks. Those three CBO-wannbes will fly down to Charlotte, NC, on March 12 for interviews with a panel of celebrity judges including ESPN college roundball guru Dick Vitale.
The winner will be revealed during the Atlantic Coast Conference’s Fan Fest in Charlotte on March 13 and will proceed to visit any conference championship venue of his or her choice with a guest through March 16. Those tourneys are the prelude to the Big Dance, the NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship Tournament.
“We really try to position ourselves as the wireless provider of college sports fans,” said Sam Zebian, Alltel director of sponsorship marketing. “This really speaks to the lifestyle idea of giving them what they want.”
The primary objective of running the contest is to build awareness for Alltel’s services—and particularly its ‘My Circle’ calling feature—with a younger demographic, Zebian said.
Alltel drew a big response from a similar My Circle First and Ten college football contest last fall. That promotion centered on markets where Alltel had sponsorships with college or pro football teams, and the contest wasn’t restricted to fanu.com members.
The basketball contest is targeted to members of the site, but aims to embrace all college basketball fans.
