Kingston University students reach Chartered Institute of Marketing competition final with innovative idea to promote Samsung's new mobile phone to Generation Z

Posted Tuesday 6 April 2021

Marketing students, from top left clockwise, Aaron Hinds, Altin Deda, and Arben Selimi reached a prestigious competition final with their innovative idea to promote a new mobile phone.

Three Kingston University marketing students made it to the final of a prestigious national competition with their original idea to make a new mobile phone appeal to Generation Z through an incentivised online learning platform.

They were one of only nine teams selected from universities around the country to be shortlisted for the final of the Chartered Institute of Marketing's The Pitch competition.

The students, Altin Deda, Aaron Hinds and Arben Selimi, who are all studying BSc Marketing and Advertising with Business Experience, formed the team ‘Advertigo' to battle it out for the top award in a virtual live final.

Now in its tenth year, The Pitch sees students from leading universities compete to respond to a live client marketing brief. The competition was sponsored this year by technology brand Samsung with teams challenged to find creative ways to market the company's new foldable mobile phone category to Generation Z – those born between 1996 and 2006.

The three second-year Kingston University students, all aged 20, entered The Pitch because they saw it as an opportunity to apply the theory that they had learned over the last 18 months on their Kingston Business School course to a brand with a challenging brief, Altin explained.

"We saw it as an opportunity to escape our comfort zones while not long before we entered The Pitch, we did very well as a group with a course assignment that was similar, and this gave us the confidence to enter the competition," he said.

The team came up with the creative idea of linking online learning to accessing discounts on some of Samsung's newest products. ProjectZ.com would be a website hosted by the technology brand and exclusive to Generation Z where they could obtain discounts on the best mobile and tablet range of products after completing online courses.

"We recognised that online learning is an important part of professional development and felt that Generation Z would be attracted to the Samsung brand through the provision of an online platform where consumers could develop and enhance their skills and employability while gaining accessible prices to top-of-the-range products," Aaron said.

To make the shortlist, the team were tasked with creating a 15-minute pitch which so impressed the judges that they reached the final last month. The final itself involved a virtual question-and-answer session with some of Samsung's senior marketing and brand directors as well as a former VP of UNiDAYS, the discount website for students.

The panel gave the team a tough grilling, Arben said. "They asked some great questions about our pitch and it was a useful insight into what business professionals in the technology industry want from marketing campaigns."

The students spoke of their gratitude to course director Dr Marvyn Boatswain and all the lecturers who have helped them develop their skills in marketing. "Our lecturers have done some immense work in helping us over the past two years and we took inspiration from all their lectures to help us with this project," Arben added.

Although they narrowly missed out in the final, the three members of Advertigo have not been discouraged. "It was a great experience and now all three of us will join internships over the summer to build our professional experience," Altin said. "We will also continue to enter competitions and we are very confident we can now go one better and win."

Categories: Enterprise and business, On campus, Staff, Students