Canada's Next Top Ad Exec sets the bar high

Alizeh Khan

The Silhouette

It’s been a year and the nationwide competition is back to make sure campus life becomes the sweet life. Bigger prizes are to be won, challenges will be overcome and the world will be conquered.

The prizes are unmatched, the stakes are high and the challenge is on to find the next university to shine and the winner to claim the title of Canada’s Next Top Ad Exec.

Having made its mark with an impressive five-year run, the competition has recommenced to challenge business students.

Encompassing marketing and advertising skills, the task is to create a pitch for the lead sponsor of the competition: Chevrolet. With a budget of 5 million dollars, the creative proposal is meant to be both realistic and intuitive.

The challenge has expanded from 17 to 29 universities all over Canada. Undergraduate and graduate students majoring and minoring in business are both eligible to take part.

The competition has reached out multiple universities through a various string of road trips that have taken place over the past two weeks.

Students have been greeted with the presence of the executive team as they have made their way to multiple central Ontario universities, including York, Wilfred Laurier and Queen’s. Various information sessions, booths and presentations have been targeted towards the students to raise awareness about the amazing opportunity that the competition presents itself to be. With on-site registration at the booths, the competition has seen increased interest and registration.

Onsite visits have had the executive providing face-to-face information about the competition, reaching out to faculty and working with Campus Account Managers (CAMs) that are the student representatives at each university.  The number of CAMs for the year has surpassed last year’s number, and 27 representatives are actively taking part in different universities.

This year the competition’s goal remains to provide an opportunity to not only win some prizes, but also potentially get hired through the challenge. The grand prize includes not only a Chevrolet Spark, but scholarships and internships.

Broken into three phases, Phase 1 includes creating an elevator pitch in which a short proposal of two where to buy levitra pages with three pages of appendices. The deadline is January 23, 2012. Phase 2 includes a detailed 15-page report and the deadline for this is Feb. 20, 2012. Finally, Phase 3 is the final phase that requires contestants to present their proposal and pitch to a panel of judges, which takes place March 25, 2012.

With further road trips planned for Eastern Ontario, the competition is growing; the task remains to reach out to further universities as the goal remains to raise registrations from the previous year.