The Willes Center for Entrepreneurship at BYU–Hawaii is well known for hosting its annual Great Ideas competition in the Fall and a companion event in the Winter semester called Empower Your Dreams. While the Great Ideas competition is typically comprised of students presenting business ideas and plans, this year included a new twist, matching the rapid evolving pace of the millennial generation. With YouTube being the world’s second largest search engine, the Fall 2014 business competition focused on video. The official title of this year’s competition was the “Great Ideas Video Competition: Tell Your Business Story.”
Video is an extremely effective business marketing component, particularly when coupled with the power of social media, mediums that the LDS Church is embracing through Mormon Messages, the Mormon Channel, and other channels. “Video is a medium that’s been around for a while and has matured enough to show people’s talent,” explains Paul Wilson, entrepreneur-in-residence at the Willes Center who has been doing internet marketing since 1999. “It helps people go after their passions and make a living at it.”
To judge the Fall 2014 Great Ideas Video Competition, well-known LDS celebrities with strong social media followings came to campus, including David Archuleta, Tiffany Alvord, Devin Graham, Stuart Edge, and Spencer Taggart. They participated by judging the videos, speaking to the students, and sharing their individual experiences about living the gospel under the social media spotlight. Together, these individuals have over 12 million social media followers. Graham, a social media content creator with over 414 million views on his YouTube channel, remarked on how important videos are for marketing ideas. “Everything now is moving to social media,” says Graham. “People are turning their eyes from TV to the Internet and Instagram and Facebook, so in order to compete now in the world, you have to know how to create content for those formats. I feel it was an awesome decision to put a focus on video in this year’s competition.” In addition to the $21,000 in prizes, the winners were competing for the opportunity of having their business video posted through the social media channels of the judges, which could potentially be worth more to the business idea than the prize money.
After months of preparing for the event, including workshops held by video experts to help competitors, contestants and judges watched two hours of finalist videos at the Polynesian Cultural Center’s IMAX Theatre. First, second, and third place winners were announced in four categories: Product, Social, Service, and Community. First place winners included the “Keep Our Bees” project which focuses on the honey bee crisis known as colony collapse disorder, “Ms. Tree Pants” which is a lifestyle clothing brand that encourages women to see their potential and self-worth, “BOX Marketing” which is a start-up marketing firm based upon the philosophy of community-generated campaigns, and “Guitar Drum” which is a mini drum attached to the front of a guitar that gives a musician the ability to tap out beats while strumming a melody.
After watching the videos, David Archuleta, a singer/songwriter and former American Idol contestant, expressed how impressed he was with many of the entiries. “Even if competitors are not video experts, this gives them the opportunity to think about how they’re going to present their ideas to the world,” said Archuleta. “It’s okay to fall down, as long as you’re willing to get back up. Dare to go out of your comfort zone. Usually if you are willing to push yourself past your limits farther than you thought you could, you will be surprised that your limits are more endless than you ever could have thought for yourself.”
“Everyone is so talented, and all the videos portray their own message,” said guest judge Tiffany Alvord, a singer/songwriter with over 5 million followers on social media channels. Alvord posted her first YouTube video at the age of 15, kick starting her own musical career. “You never know when you are taking your first steps where the journey’s going to lead you.”
See the first place winners' videos at the links below:
First Place for Product: Lenny Hatch - "Guitar Drum"
First Place for Social: Samantha Som - "Keep Our Bees"
First Place for Service: Austin Meldrum - "BOX Marketing"
First Place for Community: Megan Smee - "Ms. Tree Pants"
