ASB's Facebook lottery

Bernard Hickey
CBA's ASB, which was the first New Zealand bank to open a 'branch' on Facebook, has launched a weekly promotion on Facebook where users can 'like' a campaign to win one low interest rate mortgage.

The more times the campaign is 'liked' the lower the interest rate for the one year fixed rate mortgage will go. This week's 'like loan' was awarded for 2.4732%, which is well below ASB's regular advertised rate for a one year fixed rate mortgage of 5.19%.

This week's promotion had 638 'likes' as of Thursday morning and ASB's Facebook branch has over 72,000 'likes'.  It was most popular in Auckland among 18-24 year olds, the publicly available statistics on Facebook showed.  Entrants have to be over 18 and don't have to be an ASB customer.

The loan is up to a maximum of NZ$500,000 and can be applied to an existing loan, but cannot be used with other 'special' offers. It also includes up to NZ$1000 of 'cash-back' upfront to the borrower.

Any 'winner' in the weekly draw who doesn't take up the 'prize' is awarded NZ$2,000 in a term deposit account.

ASB opened its Facebook branch in 2010.  See the campaign page here on Facebook.