Five teams of entrepreneurs and university students will compete to earn a million dollars in a new, online reality TV show, Race to a Million. But unlike most grand prizes, the bag of cash isn’t just waiting for the contestants. Instead, they have to earn the million dollars as a team using ‘responsible, legal and creative’ money-making strategies, the contest’s website explains. The first team to turn their $500 seed money into $1 million before July 1, 2011, gets to split 70% of the profits made between themselves and a charity.

The online show, which debuted introductory videos of its teams last week, is a promotional effort by Canada’s Mastermind Development Corporation (CMDC), a Kamloops, BC-based consulting firm. What began as an idea about how to track and quantify wealth-creation strategies turned into a marketing tool for the company, CMDC co-founder Dean Pierson explains. Each week, the teams will complete blog entries and upload videos describing their strategies and progress, and viewers are encouraged to share their own ideas for making money with the teams via social media, for the chance to win a trip to BC from anywhere in the world.

Although it has already started, sponsorship opportunities for Race to a Million are still available, and include video pre-roll on weekly YouTube postings, website banner ads, mentions in branding of corporate challenges, contributing prizing that would be mentioned in promotional material and in-blog mentions.

‘What we’re really promoting is entrepreneurship, creative thinking, creative strategies for money-making,’ Pierson tells MiC, adding that any brand in the business, financial or entertainment category would be an ideal sponsor.

The show will be promoted virally through social media properties, and through a Facebook and Google ad buy, says Pierson.