Liberty team pitches marketing campaign to Amazon executives, finishes runner-up in Effie Brand Challenge

A team of three Liberty University graduate students from the School of Business and School of Communication & the Arts finished runner-up at this year’s Effie Collegiate Competition, representing the university well as they showcased their work to marketing executives at Amazon’s headquarters in Seattle.

The Effie Collegiate program provides students with the opportunity to research, ideate, and execute comprehensive marketing plans that address professional-level marketing challenges. Each year, Effie Worldwide partners with an established brand to present future marketing leaders with a challenge. This year, students teams from across the United States were challenged to create a fully integrated marketing campaign to reach the national Gen Z demographic about the benefits of an Amazon Prime membership. The team created the “For Whatever’s Next” Campaign.

Liberty’s team of Master of Arts: Strategic Communication: Public Relations student Bailey Teague and Master of Business Administration graduates Abigail Hickman (’25) and Grace Mayes (’25) traveled to Seattle and presented to multiple Amazon executives across brand, marketing, creative, and media.

Hickman said the ability to target consumers close to her own demographic was a unique task, and the team recognized the invaluable opportunity to meet with high-level executives.

“Being able to meet the Amazon clients and share our work with them was a very unique privilege that people our age don’t usually get, so it was very motivating all year to know that we were working on a big brand and that we would get to meet those people if we were to advance in the competition.”

This year marked the fourth time a team from Liberty has competed in the competition; Liberty finished first in 2024, where they pitched to the digital financial services company Ally, and runner-up in 2021, when they created a campaign for Bose.

Hickman competed in 2024 and 2025, and she said the experience has helped her see the needed balance between brand and customer.

“I’ve learned what it means to create a message that both has emotional meaning to the audience and also creates business outcomes for the brand, which is a hard line to walk, but the competition forces you to achieve both,” she said. “It’s really grown me as a marketer and communicator.”

She said this year’s team received favorable feedback from the Amazon executives.

“They really loved what we had to say, and that it was a very close call with the other team. We can’t thank Liberty enough for equipping us and our growth as professionals, and we were excited to represent Liberty well in the process.”