MSc Marketing students take up the Google Online Marketing Challenge in collaboration with Winterbourne
The Google Online Marketing Challenge is in its 8th year, attracting over 80,000 students globally across 100 countries. The main challenge involves student groups running an online marketing campaign for a local business echoing the 2013 film, The Internship. Teams will have a limited budget of $250 (approx. £163) to run Google AdWords and Google+ page over 3 weeks with an organisation that has not used Google AdWords in the past 6 months or more. Those who are keen can extend their challenge by another 2 weeks, continuing their management of the Google+ page to qualify for the Social Media Marketing category.
This year, students in the MSc Marketing Suite are taking part in the challenge, supervised by Dr David Houghton, Lecturer in Marketing in the Business School. Dr Houghton comments, “The Google Online Marketing Challenge is an excellent opportunity for our students to test themselves in the real world. With a big name in search engines behind them, our team will take their learning outside of the classroom, and into the world of marketing and consultancy. This is the first year that Birmingham Business School is to be represented in this challenge, and so I wish our student team the best of luck.”
Team Ad Lib from University of Birmingham are made up of 6 students across MSc Marketing Communications and MSc Strategic Marketing & Consulting courses who will be working with Winterbourne House and Gardens near the university campus.
Anna Fawcett, Visitor Services Manager of Winterbourne says “We are thrilled to be working with Ad Lib on the Google Online Marketing Challenge, and were delighted that they had chosen to work with a University site on the exciting venture. We are always eager to work with UoB students in a variety of different capacities, both academic and extra-curricular, and this is the first of many future collaborations.”
Neena Thomas, the Team Captain adds “Doing the GOMC challenge is a great opportunity to do something more practical outside of an academic setting. The team and I are really looking forward to working with Winterbourne, a place of heritage at the heart of University of Birmingham campus. Regardless of the outcome, it will be fantastic to volunteer our time to a noble organisation and give back to our university.”
With the challenge being running until the end of May to coincide with the American semester, the team will have work hard to balance it with exams and coursework.