Resource:How to run an eight week Ultimate Trader Challenge

This Article provides instuctions and tips on how to implement an eight week Ultimate Trader Challenge at your own campus. The Ultimate Trader Challenge drew inspiration from Kyle MacDonald and his, One Red Paper Clip story. Kyle became famous after he managed to make a series of great trades that led him from starting with a small red paper clip to his final trade of a house. This entreprenurial idea of making smart trades can be implemented on your own campus but modified to fit a college campus. The basic idea behind it is to have students start with a small object, like a pen, and then after 8 weeks see which student was able to make the best trade. Holding an event like this on your own campus helps build a community and is also a great marketing opurtunity.

Get Organized

The first step that needs to be taken is to get organized! Before being able to go out and start asking for sponsers or promoting the event you need to figure out how an event like this would best be implemented at your campus.  Make realistic goals of how  many students may attend an events like this. Have a conservative goal and a stretch goal. Think about what incentives you would like have for people who make the best trades and where you will get the starting item from.  

Marketing! 

The key to this sort of event is to really market it as well as possible especially during sign up. The more participants you have the more people will get into it. Try and start getting people excited early on. Have a big kick off party where it gives people a reason to come. Nothing attracts college students faster than free pizza or t-shirts. Try and spread the word on as many different platforms as possible be that social media, word of mouth, or professors preaching to their classes. This may be the most important part to the sucsess or failure of this event. By attracting large numbers of participants it will create a competitive enviroment and really get people excited.

Finding Funding

Finding funding can also be a very difficult part of the process. Start at your school and see if they have money put aside for hosting these sort of events. Next start reaching out to companies start local but don't underestimate what reaching out to a larger can do. In the past schools hosting these sort of events have been sucsseful by reaching out to companies like E-Bay because of the similarities to the event and the services they provide. If money is hard to find try and get companies to donate things like pizza or prizes. 

Picking a Date

Pick a time to run the event that is mellower time in the year and people are around. Also try and make it a time that can easily be repeated each year or semester. This will really help with both turn out and making it a sustainable event that will continue on in the future after you leave. 

    •    Audience (the primary audience for the event)
    •    Facilitator (how you determined who should run the event)
    •    Activity and content (how you found the type of activity and materials, and how you determined the learning or big-picture aspect)
    •    Format (the way the event is structured, length of the event, etc)
    •    Cost (all the elements that had to be paid for, and how they were paid for)
    •    Dates (how you selected the date during which the event was held)
    •    Fundraising and sponsorships (how you found the money and/or dealt with sponsors)
    •    Space (what elements you were looking for, the location, and how you found the right space)
    •    Branding (how you determined the name and overall message for the event)
    •    Promotion (how you invited participants and shared the details with your primary audience)
    •    Support (students, faculty, staff needed to facilitate prior to and during the event)
    •    Event logistics (what else needed to be done prior to and during the event)
    •    Media capture (how you arranged for photos or video to be captured)
    •    Activities (how the activities were presented and run)
    •    Evaluation (measuring impact and numbers of participants)
    •    Sustainability and planning for future events (elements necessary to ensure that the event would happen again if desired)
    •    Future leadership (how you figured out who would lead this event after you graduate)
    •    Lessons learned and tips for others (what worked and what didn’t, and your recommendations for others)