Our staff of volunteers at the Runners Rising Project knew we needed to make a big splash on all social media platforms on our launch day. The success of this project depends on our ability to reach the UTSA fanbase and business community, then engage them in learning about the community benefits of Name, Image, and Likeness opportunities.
As part of our initial launch outreach we wanted to work with a UTSA student-athlete who embodied our organizational values, had deep ties with the San Antonio athletics community, and had serious social media skills. We identified UTSA soccer standout Kendall Kloza as a perfect athlete to work with to promote our brand. A Kinesiology major at UTSA, Kendall is on track to graduate with her degree this winter.
We signed Kendall to an NIL contract to do an Instagram “takeover” of our Instagram account on our launch day. We asked Kendall to promote the takeover on our account, then simply record her day-to-day activities as a student-athlete at UTSA. Kendall even went a step further and held an impromptu question and answer session with our Instagram followers.
This deal was a huge success for us as our Instagram audience grew by 58% since we announced the NIL agreement with Kendall. Our engagement rate also sky-rocketed, increasing by over 100%. In return, Kendall received a cash payment from Runners Rising. We think this deal is a great example of how NIL can be beneficial to both student-athletes and businesses!
If you missed the live takeover we’ve recorded it for posterity and embedded it at the bottom of this post. Thanks again to Kendall for being so awesome to work with.
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