Best of CASE District V Award
 

Institution: Miami University

Title of entry: Miami Regionals GIPHY

About this entry: Following recommendations to strengthen our inbound marketing strategy, our team identified an opportunity to increase brand awareness in a cost-effective way. Our target audience included current and prospective regional campus students, particularly Gen Z users who actively engage on Instagram and Snapchat.
We launched a branded GIPHY channel, creating easily shareable animated graphics that students could incorporate into their own social content. We debuted the initiative with a graduation-themed set of 10 original graphics featuring inclusive messaging (majors, first-generation students, and international students). Our goal was to help students feel seen and represented while amplifying our brand through peer-to-peer sharing.
The response exceeded expectations. Individual graphics generated more than 70,000 views each, and the project quickly expanded into seven themed sets supporting milestones such as orientation, Weeks of Welcome, admissions decisions, and De-Stress Week.
Across platforms where GIPHY integrates, the initiative has generated 9.4 million total views, with top-performing GIFs reaching 4.1 million and 1 million views respectively. On average, animations now receive at least 250,000 monthly views.
What began as a small, no-cost experiment became a scalable brand-awareness engine, extending our reach to millions and strengthening our regional campuses’ identity as accessible, engaging, and student-centered.