Instead of attending class, five Syracuse University students spent the first week of the semester touring Qatar and pitching an ad campaign to a panel of 2022 FIFA World Cup executives.

On Jan. 16, members of The NewHouse, a student-run advertising agency at SU, won first place at the Qatar 2022 Women’s Soccer Challenge advertising competition. Elements from their campaign, along with some from the second and third place finishing teams, will be used to encourage Qatari girls, ages 6-14, to play soccer. EdVenture Partners, a student-marketing accelerator, managed the competition with the Centre for Integrated Marketing Communications at San Diego State University.

The winning campaign, “Find it in Football,” is a multiplatform marketing experience that promotes the physical and mental benefits of the sport, while highlighting its ability to connect people cross-culturally through confidence, teamwork and family.

“We call it a human truth,” said Bryan Chin-Yu Chou, account manager and senior advertising major. “We believe that passion grows organically through playing football. You become dependent on your teammates; you grow to love your coach, the sport and the people you play with. And that is beyond language, religion and culture.”

The three finalists — from an original pool of 33 teams — were notified on Christmas Eve. From that point, up until the minutes preceding the final presentations, teams were allowed to edit their campaigns.

The NewHouse team only made a few very small changes during the four days leading up to the live pitch after traveling more than 1000 miles to Doha, Qatar — nearly missing a connecting flight in Germany.

They didn’t feel a need to alter their campaign much. After months of preparation, the teammates said they had an air of confidence among them.

As they toured the city, they made mental notes of ideal locations for their advertisements — helpful details when presenting to the judges.

One of the team’s ideas was to place two billboards on opposite sides of a road. Each would play a video loop of a player kicking a ball off screen. Appearing as though the two athletes were passing the ball back and forth.

“Seeing everything and being there really affirmed our campaign,” said Kaitlyn Froboese, a creative on the team and senior advertising major. “We realized that a lot of their goals aligned with what we had set up.”

Before everything came together, though, the team worked all through winter break, developing mockups and rationales. Froboese said her family was annoyed that she worked all day on Christmas.

But neither holidays nor different time zones got in the way. Of the five teammates, two operated from the East Coast, one in Texas, another in California and a fifth from South Africa.

“It was nice to finally come together and see what we had been working on over break,” said Melanie Holohan, the team’s research director and a senior advertising major. “It was a confirmation.”

They had only their speaking parts to polish while in Qatar. The rest of their time was spent touring the extravagances of the city.

Each team took part in various activities, including a trip to the Museum of Islamic Art, a desert safari and a tour of Aspire Academy for Sports Excellence — a hub for the most promising young male athletes in Qatar.

Additionally, participants were housed in private rooms at the W Doha Hotel, served complimentary three-course meals and sailed around the city in Dhow boats. Holohan said she suspected the five-star treatment was to show that the Qatari lifestyle could adapt to different cultures.

“They used us as kind of ambassadors for their culture,” Holohan said. “They want to make sure that when the World Cup comes around that people feel comfortable traveling there.”

Qatar won the bid for the 2022 World Cup in 2010 and started construction almost immediately. Though newly developed, Qatar has an estimated GDP per capita of $100,900 and as of 2012, an unemployment rate of 0.5 percent, according to the Central Intelligence Agency’s World Factbook.

The World Cup is part of Qatar’s plan to maintain that development and a high standard of living, according to one of the Pillars of Qatar National Vision 2030. Its people are eager to present their country as a competitive nation among world leaders in sports.

The future of The NewHouse’s campaign lies in the hands of Qatar’s 2022 Supreme Committee marketers, but it also seemed to align well with the Qatar National Vision. The five teammates, in fact, were approached after the competition and offered jobs after graduation in May, Bryan Chin-Yu Chou said.

Published on January 20, 2014 at 9:36 pm

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