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Big 10 Fan Fest

Building a social-first fan experience around college football culture

As the official hotel partner of the Big Ten Conference Football Championship, Hilton transformed Fan Fest into an immersive brand experience spanning Graduate by Hilton, Hampton by Hilton, and Hilton Honors. 

The challenge was to create social content that felt native to both college football fandom and modern TikTok behavior—while balancing multiple Hilton brands within one cohesive campaign.

Instead of treating Fan Fest like traditional event coverage, we approached it as a social-first storytelling system built around:

  • Fandom rituals

  • Internet culture

  • Trend participation

  • Nostalgia

  • POV-driven content 


The creative strategy gave each Hilton brand a distinct role:

 

  • Graduate by Hilton leaned into school spirit, hidden Easter eggs, and nostalgia-driven storytelling

  • Hampton by Hilton reframed familiar amenities like waffles and breakfast as recognizable fan rituals

  • Hilton Honors focused on exclusive, “money-can’t-buy” access moments​

Content included:

  • TikTok trend adaptations

  • Scripted Reels

  • POV-style event coverage

  • Interactive carousels

  • Short-form storytelling, optimized for retention and engagement

My Role

Touching on my experience in storytelling, social strategy, and messaging frameworks, I:

  • Led copy across all campaign social content

  • Developed TikTok and Reels concepts, scripts, and storylines

  • Defined tone of voice and social messaging systems across brands

  • Partnered on social strategy and creative direction

  • Wrote all captions, supers, and platform-native copy

Takeaway

This project showed how hospitality brands can participate in sports culture through audience behavior and storytelling—not just sponsorship visibility.

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