Listen to this articleCampus Essentials is a free social market site for students to buy, sell, and find anything from books, study guides, house parties or even jobs and rentals posted by local businesses. This site is made for students run by students and has to offer things such as planning trips with other students, finding roommates, and much more. Below is our interview with Matt Spanburg, founder of Campus Essentials:
Q: Matt, tell us something more about Campus Essentials?
A: CampusEssentials.com is website first of its kind. This site provides college students with a private and free hub to buy, sell, trade and interact with other students at their college. Students can post anything from books, study guides, rooms for rent, papers to be edited, weekend activities and even plan trips! The way it works is simple, to become a student user one must own a college sponsored .edu address that can be confirmed, and once you confirm the student is free to explore the site. Campus Essentials is also a great way to find great opportunities such as internships, rentals, events, and so much more. It is the one stop shop for students.
Q: Who Can Use Campus Essentials?
A: There two different types of users for the site. The first type of user is of course students, college professors, and alumni. Anyone possessing a .edu email can sign up under the college they belong too and have full access to the site.
The second type of user is businesses/business owners. We created a separate portal for businesses to post different types of ads such as job and internship opportunities, events, apartments for rent, even bar specials and pet adoptions. Businesses are allowed to pick which schools they want to target or can advertise on a national basis. Other advertisement options are our fixed and triggered ads. Both fixed and triggered ads are side located ads that drive the user to the businesses website. Triggered ads are triggered when users type a certain word in the search bar set by the business.
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Q: Why Would Businesses Want to Advertise on Campus Essentials compared to other sites such as Facebook or craigslist?
A: Campus Essentials is the first business to successfully directly bridge the gap between college students and businesses. The site allows businesses to target certain regions to reach the next up and comers of our society. No longer do businesses have to worry about who they are marketing towards, but know they are getting our societies brightest and hardest workers. College students are the perfect target market to reach because they are an untapped market and the next generation coming up in the world that is going to make a real difference.
Q: How are students grouped on Campus Essentials?
A: The way users are grouped on Campus Essentials is by the college they attend. Students sign up under their college or the closest one to them, but can also reach out to other students at other schools, just by simply changing the college page they are on.
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Q: Is there a social media side to Campus Essentials?
A: We wanted to incorporate a social media side to Campus Essentials. This way it makes students feel safe and confident that what they are sharing is with other students. So we have a section in the student side of the site called “The Bulletin” which allows students to post anything from how they are feeling at that moment, to pictures and videos.
Q: What is your startup story? How did the idea behind Campus Essentials come about?
A: Campus Essentials all started as a project my junior semester at Flagler College for a business management class. We were told to come up with a business concept that we would have to present and gain the approval of fellow students on campus. So I first began to analyze problems that needed to be addressed. The first problem that arose was that I felt college students get taken advantage of on everything we need for school and there is nothing to help improve interaction of college students at each college campus. So I came up with this concept of a social market site for students. The project was such a big hit that I decided to pursue it and for the last two years we have been coding and recoding the site until we came up with a perfect solution for students. Starting a business in college can be stressful, but it makes for a perfect opportunity to seize the resources the school provides. Which in my case was many business professors providing free advice and helping to push me in the right direction. So with some financial help from my family and the support of my great professors and close college friends, I was able to create Campus Essentials and get it to where it is today!
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Q: What are your plans for the next year?
A: We have so much planned for the year here at Campus Essentials. From cross country college tours to sponsoring and hosting events. We really want to focus on improving the site day by day and to create a community behind us to help improve the lives of college students across the board. We have found that just staying busy 24/7 has been very beneficial and we will continue to strive to keep the movement of a site by students for students as a platform.
Q: How would you convince the reader to start using Campus Essentials?
A: To convince any of the readers to use Campus Essentials, I would simply say if you are a college student and want to improve your college career by saving money, meeting new students, and improving grades then look no further because Campus Essentials can do all of the above and much more. As for our business readers, Campus Essentials would be a great tool for your business to find the next generation of intelligent, hardworking, and driven individuals to help take your business to the next level. College students are one of the most lucrative untapped groups out there and are an important group to follow and stay in touch with because they are and will be the next generation of individuals that will change the world.
Q: What can we expect from Campus Essentials in the future?
A: You can expect a lot from Campus Essentials in the future, the possibilities are endless in our line of business. First, we are going to take our product globally. I don’t want to say too much to give anything away, but Campus Essentials will become a main productive tool throughout the years for colleges across the world to better streamline the different steps professors and students must take. Just you wait!
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