Student Team Takes 2nd at Marketing Competition

In May, a student team from the Isenberg course Internet Marketing won second-place honors in this year’s International Digital Marketing Competition. In the contest, each team of two to four undergraduates does marketing research and devises a digital marketing plan on behalf of a real-world client. The Isenberg student team—Decaf—lent its acumen to the firm Super Coffee, which produces ready-to-drink coffees for sale through retailers, including Target and Walmart (and their websites). With college students as its target market, Decaf developed a digital marketing plan comprising research, paid and owned strategy, media, and evaluation.

Decaf’s members are Cameron Butler ’21 (marketing), Ashley Justiniano ’21 (marketing), Evan Kelley ’21 (marketing), and Joy Zaniboni ’21 (psychology).

The team’s second-place finish was no mean feat, observes Isenberg marketing PhD candidate Hossein Hashemi, who taught the Internet Marketing course and critiqued Decaf along the way. The competition, he notes, attracted 149 teams to its first round—a video pitch. Decaf and four other teams made it to the finals, where professional marketers and members of each client’s management team judged each 15-minute online presentation. “Our students exhibited perseverance, intelligence and teamwork,” emphasizes Hashemi. “They truly deserved what they achieved. I couldn’t have been prouder.”