Be 'loud and famous' with Big and Sony Ericsson

It’s goodbye to the ragging routine and welcome to a new platform for interaction between seniors and freshers on the first day of college. That’s Big 92.7 FM and Sony Ericsson’s recently launched Sony Ericsson Big Loud and Famous Fresher contest.

In a bid to strengthen its brand slogan, 'Life Banao', Big FM, Adlabs' radio venture, launched the contest in association with the mobile phone company. The contest, which was launched simultaneously in 10 cities – Hyderabad, Kanpur, Kolkata, Thiruvananthapuram, Surat, Udaipur, Agra, Visakhapatnam, Chandigarh and Amritsar – on September 8, will pick out the Loud and Famous Fresher couple.

Based on the performance of the participants, the final 30 contestants will be shortlisted. After a mix of on-ground, on-air and web based contests, the final Sony Ericsson Big Loud and Famous Male and Female Fresher will be chosen for each city.

Manoj George, national head, Big Reach, Big FM, tells afaqs!, " The first few months were difficult. We had to do a lot of building up, with posters in all the colleges of the 10 cities and teasers running on air along with emails and blasters. However, after the good response – we've had more than a lakh students participating so far – it has proved to be an effective brand building exercise."

Simple Khanna, product group marketing manager, Sony Ericsson, says, "The entire proposition from Big FM was in sync with our designs, the target audience and the locations. While metros have always been an important market for us, this contest has given us a chance to increase our reach in smaller cities like Surat, where telecommunication is on the rise."

The finalists of the contests will all get a funky hairdo from Streax. Each winner couple will be given a Sony Ericsson R300 mobile.

Yamaha and AHA have been roped in by Big FM as the associate sponsors for Hyderabad, while the entire on-ground initiative is being handled by its own activation cell.