• by P.J. Bednarski  @pjbtweet, May 7, 2020

Michelob Ultra is putting lots of faith in the power of social media and the allure of pop star Maluma to make a quickie Mother’s Day promotion come off.

The premium beer brand only announced the contest Thursday at noon. The winners will be announced Friday by 6 p.m. The promotion is one of several in which brands are attempting to create a Mother’s Day event in the absence of a physical meeting between moms and their kids.

The contest goes like this, according to instructions from Michelob Ultra: Loving children should schedule a Zoom call with their mom for Sunday between 3-3:30 pm. EST.

Then they go  to the Anheuser-Busch InBev brand’s Twitter, Instagram or Facebook social feeds to “drop us a comment telling us why your mom is great using #Ultramom and #sweepstakes.”

Then wait, but not for long. Working with the speed of a nimble dry cleaner, Michelob Ultra will inform five people they’re winners by Friday night at 6 p.m. EST.

On the winners' Zoom calls Sunday, “Maluma will pop in and surprise your mom with the Mother’s Day wish of a lifetime!”

Michelob Ultra’s last-minute contest may force followers to react in a way marketers like: quickly. In February, National Geographic gave its Instagram followers 24 hours to submit their best NatiGeo-like photo. That generated 233,738 responses, according to the social media analytics firm, ListenFirst. (But the grand prize was a Tanzania safari.)

It's hard to categorize what a typical mother is like these days, but it’s quite possible Maluma’s guest appearance might really, really be a surprise. Marketing Daily asked a Michelob Ultra representative if Maluma was really that well-known.  

She politely explained the 26-year-old Colombian is a hot international star with 49 million followers on Instagram alone. He recently recorded a duet with Madonna, and has a relationship with Michelob Ultra in which he's already appeared in two ads, in one of which he had a starring role.

Maluma also made some mom news last year when he was criticized in some circles for giving his mom a Mother’s Day kiss some felt was too passionate. He explained the kiss on the lips was just a cultural thing. She stuck up for him. That’s what mothers always do.