When agency websites say “award-winning,” ask which award. Here’s our honest version: MarkitAds grew up inside the UNC Chapel Hill entrepreneurship ecosystem — Launch Chapel Hill, the venture accelerator, and 1789 / Innovate Carolina, the university’s founder community.
What that actually gave us: structured mentorship from operators who’d done it before; deadline pressure with demo days attached; a bench of advisors (including from the University of Wisconsin network) who still answer my calls; and the campus-insider view of how universities think — which became a real asset when UNC itself became a client.
For student founders: your university’s accelerator is the cheapest leverage you’ll ever get. Take every office hour. It’s a large part of why a bedroom company survived to become a real one.