TCU’s Student Agency wins top award at Worthy’s for a Valentine’s Day Campaign for TCU Men’s Tennis

Roxo’s Kayla Emmerson and her team scored a 2014 Worthy Award from the Greater Fort Worth Chapter of PRSA for the fun and flirty social media campaign they devised and conducted for TCU’s Men’s Tennis.

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Kayla Emmerson and Kelly Brown after receiving a Worthy Award.

Lauren, Maddie Slezak and Lauren Pennington came up with a highly effective strategy tied to Valentine’s Day that helped establish a brand personality for the team and increase attendance at its opening games in late February.

The tennis team had approached Roxo, TCU’s student-run agency strategic communication, for help with a challenge. The team wanted to remain one of the top schools in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association for game attendance.  Roxo sought to go one step further and increase attendance by targeting TCU sorority women, specifically.

Roxo used Valentine’s Day as a “hook” for the campaign.  The team designed flirtatious Valentine’s Day cards using a Ryan Gosling-themed meme format and profiling each tennis player.  The cards read,  “Hey girl, you look great… but you would look even better watching my match. Feb 21st at 5:30.”

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Advertisement created by Roxo.

Roxo interviewed all 10 tennis players with questions they could use on the cards: “What would be your perfect date?” and, “Tell us your best pick up line.”   The cards featured each teammate’s home town and favorite pick-up line, as well as basic guidelines for the sorority competition: “Share the front of this card on Facebook tagging TCU Men’s Tennis, or Tweet @TCUMensTennis to find out. Part of the sorority competition?

Roxo’s campaign generated results that far exceeded the objectives. The campaign increased attendance at the opening matches by more than 20 percent over the previous year.  Before Roxo’s involvement, the TCU team had an average reach of 500 people on Facebook. On Valentine’s Day Roxo increased the reach to 33,400 people.

The Worthy Award is the highest-level honor in the student contest sponsored by the Greater Fort Worth Chapter PRSA.