Leveraging Loyola — beyond the bracket.

In 2021 — as their men’s basketball team was the “Cinderella” of the NCAA season — Loyola University and Borshoff partnered together to strategically celebrate the school’s success “Beyond the Bracket.”

The main goal? To emphasize Loyola’s focus on sustainability to prospective students during the March Madness tournament. This focus on sustainability mirrored Gen Z’s eagerness to align with value-oriented brands.

To reach this audience during the advertising-packed tournament, we identified appropriate media pitches, pitched locally and nationally, and coordinated interviews with popular Loyola personalities and athletes. Paid media focused on basketball content while earned media coverage landed on USA Today, the Associated Press, CNN, ESPN, and more.

As a result, more than 55 million impressions came from this partnership. There were 30,000 new website users with 1,600 daily unique visits, 2.7 million impressions, and over 130,000 clicks on digital ads.