On May 10th, the final of the Latvian Entrepreneurship development competition “Bizness24h” 2021 was held. The participants presented the sales funnels that they developed in the second round of the competition and their transformation during the competition to the grand jury. The first place and title “Business Guru 2021” was obtained by the team “Trīs lietas manā zāļu skapītī stāv”, representing Riga State Gymnasium No.1 and Agenskalna State Gymnasium. As part of the competition, the team developed a sales funnel for a company, boosting sales of the tire assembly service.
As part of the final round of the competition, each team had to establish a collaboration with a company that would entrust the participants to create a sales funnel page and a set of digital marketing activities for a product, in addition to attracting customers. In the final of the competition the set of activities carried out by the teams, the profit indicators achieved and the personal growth of the participants were assessed. The second round of the competition took place over more than two months, in which the teams’ players not only learned basic knowledge on building sales funnels but also developed their sales, communications, and leadership skills. Participants developed sales funnels for a variety of products that companies sell in Latvia and other European countries. They had to familiarize themselves with the specifics of sales for a variety of products, such as ecological juices for children, beauty and cleaning products, various garden products (awnings, wooden sneakers, and garden boxes), as well as webinars and even driving training courses.
The results achieved by the “Bizness24h” 2021 finalists were assessed by the jury panel, consisting of Uģis Strauss, member of the board of the Nordic Group, Anda Grebeža, manager of the Swedbank marketing and sales projects, Dace Dumbere-Bregže, senior project manager of the Investment and Development Agency of Latvia, BA School of Business and Finance Rector Līga Peiseniece, BA School of Business and Finance study director of the “Business Process Management” program Lilita Sparāne and Head of “Bizness24h” 2021 Elīna Peiseniece. At the end of the final, the jury’s representatives acknowledged that they were pleasantly surprised by the achievements of the participants since the finalists were able to prove that as high-school students or students, they were able to address companies to entrust them with the organization of selling and marketing their products. The contestants themselves recognize that the competition has served as a stepping-stone to believe the limits of their capabilities. During the final, several teams acknowledged that, after the competition, they will continue cooperation with the companies, continuing to work on existing sales funnels and creating new ones for other products.
The team that picked the winning laurels in the competition was “Trīs lietas manā zāļu skapītī stāv” (the team includes Riga State Gymnasium No. 1 and Agenskalna State Gymnasium pupils Krišs Krišjānis Millers, Pēteris Leveika, Roberts Darkevics), that developed a sales funnel and a set of digital marketing for the tire assembly service. As the main prize, the team won a €1,500 rebate on tuition fees at the BA School of Business and Finance, licensing rights for one year for the US company’s ClickFunnell platform, and the title of “Business Guru 2021.” The second place and the prize from TET were obtained by the team “SouthAmericanImports24h” (the team was composed of Agenskalna State Gymnasium pupils Voldemārs Dubults, Regnārs Slapiņš, Toms Lukša), whose developed sales funnel offered customers to purchase driving and theory training in one of Latvia’s largest driving schools. On the other hand, the third place and awards from the LIAA went to the team “But First – Business”, (the team was composed of Jelgava Spidola Gymnasium pupils Estere Linkevica, Matilde Marija Feldmane, Madara Bērziņa ), whose developed sales funnel looked for customers for tree-branch chiselers in Norway. In addition to the previously-mentioned prize fund, the participants also received various awards from the supporters of the competition – Hipotential.lv, Dienas Bizness, Swedbank, Purvors, VR Gaming Latvia, Tilde, Izdevniecība avots, etc.
“Bizness24h” is the largest annual business simulation contest in Latvia for secondary pupils and students, within which participants can gain new knowledge of business or check on existing by participating in realistic simulations. This year, the competition was completed for the 13th time, and for the first time it was organized completely remotely, around 700 pupils and students enrolled for the 1st round, of which 300 best, or 100 teams, were nominated for participation in the 2nd round, but only 12 best teams were able to present their results to the finals jury of the competition to fight for the title “Business Guru 2021”.
The competition is organized by the Student Council of BA School of Business and Finance in cooperation with BA School of Business and Finance, Nordic Group, the Investment and Development Agency of Latvia (LIAA), and TET.
You can look back on the course of the competition on the www.bizness24h.lv website or the Facebook page www.facebook.com/Bizness24h.