Integrated

In the US, many inner-city high school students rely on sport scholarships to make college affordable. But to qualify, they must meet certain academic requirements regulated by the NCAA. Our challenge was to build awareness of these requirements among an audience indifferent to both academic messaging and traditional marketing. Our insight? Athletes who aren't allowed to play get “benched”. So we used that common term to frame the conversation: Get the right grades in high school, or get benched in college. And who better to hear that from than The Bench himself? In this integrated campaign, we brought The Bench to life as a smack-talking spokesperson reaching an engagement level on Twitter 233% higher than the industry average. And the campaign went viral. Having paid for just 800,000 impressions online, the campaign earned over 60 million. And best of all, traffic to the NCAA’s eligibility information website increased by 730%.

In just 3 months, The Bench racked up an impressive 25,000 followers on Twitter. And it wasn't just The Bench talking to students; the students talked back to The Bench, about everything from the College World Series to the A minus they got on their history test. The Bench reached an engagement level on Twitter 233% higher than the industry average. And the campaign went viral. Having paid for just 800,000 impressions online, the campaign earned over 60 million. And best of all, traffic to the NCAA’s eligibility information website increased by 730%.

We launched The Bench on Twitter, where he tweeted about sports and academics in a wisecracking, witty and bold tone that teens didn't expect from an institution like the NCAA. To help build our audience, The Bench sought out student-athletes who had tweeted about their studies and replied to them with quick-witted quips. We then filmed a hidden-camera stunt where The Bench surprised a group of real high school athletes. Using our growing audience, we launched our video on Twitter and garnered national media attention. We fueled the conversation with everything from daily, eye-catching Instagrams and Vines to hidden-camera videos posted real-time from the world’s biggest basketball event – The Final Four. And we supported it all with a host of other media, from bus wraps to posters, pointing our audience to The Bench on Twitter.

The NCAA recently toughened its academic requirements making it harder for high school athletes to become college athletes. Research showed the change in academic eligibility standards was most likely to affect inner-city student-athletes from disadvantaged homes, those who might not be able to afford college without a sport scholarship. Our challenge? Build awareness among an audience indifferent to both academic messaging and traditional marketing. We had to make our message relevant to this hard-to-reach audience. Our insight? It’s widely understood among athletes that those who aren't allowed to play get “benched”. So we used that common term to frame the conversation: Get the right grades in high school, or get benched in college. Our idea? We brought The Bench to life and made him our smack-talking, tough-love spokesperson. In this highly engaging, fully integrated campaign, he became a daily reminder of what happens if you don’t watch your grades.