Wake Forest MBA Marketing Summit forum examines innovative and creative brands

Two panel discussions on using innovation and creativity to build a brand and a creative advertising competition featuring prominent local agencies highlight the Marketing Forum, scheduled for Friday, Feb. 10, at Wait Chapel on the Wake Forest University campus.

The forum, which is free and open to the public, is part of the three-day Wake Forest MBA Marketing Summit, scheduled Feb. 9-11 at Wake Forest’s Babcock Graduate School of Management.

The forum, titled “Using Innovation and Creativity to Drive Your Brand,” includes two panel discussions. Panelists for the morning discussion, titled “Innovative and Creative Brands” and scheduled for 9-11:30 a.m., include Amy Curtis-McIntyre, former chief marketing officer of Jet Blue, and Cammie Dunaway, CMO of Yahoo!

Panelists for the afternoon session, titled “What Makes Great Creative?” and scheduled from 3-4 p.m., include Donna Lee, CMO of BellSouth; Judy Verses, CMO of Verizon; and Todd Townsend, vice president and CMO of Sonic drive-in restaurants.

A creative competition, hosted by the American Association of Advertising Agencies and featuring multimedia advertising campaigns designed by association members, is scheduled from 1:30-3 p.m. just before the afternoon discussion. Panelists will lead a critical analysis and conversation after each agency’s presentation and will present the 2006 Marketing Summit Creative Excellence Award to the winner. The audience will select its own People’s Choice winner.

Other Marketing Summit events include the 16th annual MBA Marketing Case Competition and the Undergraduate Challenge, an undergraduate marketing case competition.

The MBA case competition involves teams of MBA students from UCLA, Michigan, Northwestern, UCLA, Texas, Vanderbilt, Washington, Wisconsin and Wake Forest. The teams have 36 hours to respond to a marketing challenge presented by the event’s corporate sponsor, whose identity remains undisclosed until the case is assigned. Judges include four chief marketing officers from Fortune 500 companies, including one from the sponsor. The winning team receives $5,000.

Past corporate sponsors have included Apple Computer, Coca-Cola, EchoStar Communications, GlaxoSmithKline, Heineken USA, IBM, Lowe’s Home Improvement Warehouse, Microsoft, Planters Life Savers, R.J. Reynolds, Sara Lee and Wachovia Wealth Management.

More information on all summit events is available at www.mba.wfu.edu/marketingsummit.