University of Missouri–St. Louis students placed second in a marketing campaign for Chevy Spark vehicle. The campaign, which included a Facebook page, was targeted at college students.
When Joan Hutchinson enrolled in a marketing class at the University of Missouri–St. Louis last semester, she wasn’t expecting to work on a real marketing campaign for Chevy. Nor was she expecting to compete with other college teams and place second on her first marketing plan, but that’s what happened.
Hutchinson and a team of seven other UMSL students in the Management of Promotion class taught by Min Ju, visiting assistant professor of marketing at UMSL, competed against their classmates to create a marketing campaign for the new Chevy Spark vehicle. Their plan was than selected to complete against teams from other universities, including Lindenwood University in St. Charles, Mo., and Washington University in St. Louis. They placed second overall.
“The whole experience was great,” Hutchinson said. “We learned a lot, things we didn’t think about, that go into creating and implementing a marketing campaign. It really was great to have that hands-on experience and to take that with me into other projects I will work on in the future.”
The team also included: Samar Behbehani, Brittany Chambers, Tiffany Eddington, Hannah Rene Lee, Robert Rodriguez, Nicole Schroeder and Brad Vorbeck.
Ju said the Chevrolet Dealer Group asked each team to create a “live” marketing plan, including a 30-second television advertisement, social media plan and an event to kick off the campaign. Once teams were selected from each participating university, Chevy provided a $2,000 budget for each group.
“We started by doing a survey of our target audience, which was college students,” Hutchinson said. “We discovered they weren’t going to read a magazine, so to reach them we wanted to focus on social media instead of print advertising. We created a Facebook page and hosted a kickoff event on campus with a band, refreshments and a chance to look at the car, the Chevy Spark. We asked for feedback, what they liked about the car, would they buy it and what features were good selling points.”
The UMSL team then presented their campaign to executives at Chevrolet Dealer Group.
“Our campaign tied for first with Lindenwood and we were asked to present again,” she said “They then chose their campaign over ours, but even placing second is a huge honor. We had never created a marketing campaign, worked together as a group or event presented to executives before. Having this experiences has taught us all a lot.”
Ju agrees and said her students should be commended for their performance.
“Our students showed their creativity, professionalism and hard work through the whole process,” she said. “They should all be very proud of what they accomplished.”
