Student Team Places Second in Digital Marketing Competition

Three college students stand in the middle of a greenhouse holding a laptop that reads Plantennas Digital Marketing Pitch on the screen.
Alasdair Ferrier ‘25, Marguerite Bartlett ‘25, and Kai Hillier ‘26

Every semester, students enrolled in the Digital Marketing course participate in the Digital Marketing Competition hosted by Purdue University. Teams of up to four students are given a client brief and must conceive, develop, and pitch a detailed digital marketing plan to them. The top six teams are invited to compete in a final round with extended pitches, and the winners are chosen.

Matt Hanson told us, “As the Director of the Digital Marketing Competition, I’m envious of the talent that comes from these programs. I wish I had a place for every one of them to join one of my teams.”

Almost 200 undergraduate teams participated this year, and Wheaton College had three teams in the top 25. A team of Marguerite Bartlett ‘25, Alasdair Ferrier ‘25, and Kai Hillier ‘26 placed second in the world. 

“I believe experiential learning is vital for my students,“ shared C.C. Chapman, a senior professor of the practice in the Business and Economics department. “This competition is the perfect project to empower our students to take what they are learning in the classroom and put it immediately into practice through a series of assignments building up to their final pitch. Plus, it gives them something to show potential employers in the future beyond only a good grade.”

Kai, a business major, expressed, “Doing this competition set this class apart for me. It can be hard to gain real-world experience in the classroom, so creating something for a real client who is giving us feedback on our work is cool.”

This semester, the client was Plantennas, a startup seeking to revolutionize plant management through its smart, biodegradable pots. They challenged students to develop a go-to-market digital strategy that included choosing a specific target market, creating assets to drive sales, and creating a budget. 

As a neuroscience major, Marguerite helped steer the team to focus on a research-based target market. Their campaign tagline, “Smarter Plants. Faster Cures,” exposed the client to a new market. 

“We learned a great deal about Pharmacognosy and without Wheaton College’s expertise on the subject, we’d still be ignorant of the opportunity,” expressed Mont Handley, Plantennas’ Co-Founder.

The Business and Economics Department is dedicated to ensuring that students develop the skills they’ll need to be successful in whatever career path they choose. Beyond gaining knowledge of specific disciplines, there is a strong emphasis on writing, research, and presentation skills. 

“While building our final pitch deck, we had to effectively communicate and present our ideas, which will help me going forward,” shared mathematics and economics double major Alasdair. “The biggest challenge for me was extending and improving our pitch deck from the initial presentation and ensuring the judges understood our perspective.”

All three students are also accomplished college athletes in track and field, soccer, and cross-country running. Margaritte believes this helped them excel as a team. “We all take competition seriously, and we each brought different strengths, so it worked really well. I was excited to collaborate with my friends and see what we could accomplish together.”

MGMT-355 Digital Marketing is taught every semester, and you can watch the winning pitch here.

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