AD Me wins Student Marketing Competition 2018

This year's brief set by Royal Mail intended to challenge, and that it did. Over 40 teams submitted entries in response, which tasked students to increase direct mail revenue by encouraging the top 150 brands and agencies to use the channel when targeting young people. The combination of b2b and direct mail certainly pushed students out of their ‘digital comfort zones’, but the creative and innovative nature of the entries demonstrated the bright future of our industry.

Team AD Me from the University of Greenwich included Guadalupe Contartese, Imane Erriade, Imogen Thompson, Nadia El Hadji and Radoslava Radkova, and were presented with the Gold Award for their outstanding response. They clinched victory after a live pitch against 3 other finalist teams in front of a panel of marketing experts including Debbie Moffat (Business Development Consultant at Royal Mail MarketReach), Jane Cave (MD of the IDM), Kate Burnett (MD of DMA Talent) and Phil Rickets (Head of Business Development at Royal Mail MarketReach). As well as the top prize, this year’s winners also received a £1,500 team cash prize. The runners up were ‘Royal Direct’ from Northumbria University and ‘The You Experience’ from Sheffield Hallam University.

Phil Rickets, Head of Business Development at Royal Mail MarketReach, said: “I have been blown away by the standard of entries and confidence of the students during the live pitches. The array of creative ideas underpinned by sound strategic thinking from those that made the shortlist in particular is a credit to them and the Universities they’ve come from. At the end of the day, we had to choose a single winner and AD Me came up with a campaign that understood the unique B2B and B2C nature of Royal Mail’s business. They brought in a strong creative idea and a holistic approach that came together for a consistent narrative culminating in compelling campaign deliverables.”

Kate Burnett, MD of DMA Talent, said: “This year’s brief was one of the first with a B2B focus for a number of years, which meant a different challenge for this year’s entrants. Despite that, the quality of the entries has continued to improve every year that I’ve been involved with the competition, making this one of the toughest years to judge. Every year, the Student Marketing Competition gives us a window into the future of our industry and judging by the marketing talent I’ve seen, the future for our sector will be in creative, data-aware and strategic hands.”

The Student Marketing Competition is in its 22nd year and gives students the chance to work on a real-life marketing brief. It's used by lecturers across the country as a valuable teaching aid on marketing and business courses.