Amplify the Moment: Demand Generation in Real Time

Keano Mestre
3 hours ago
5 min read

In an ideal world, buzz, word of mouth, and fan momentum can feed itself. However, more often than not, athletics, performing arts and live entertainment need to spark interest proactively and that’s exactly where a strong digital advertising strategy comes in to play. When things are quiet, a smart push can shift the needle.

In this blog we will walk through how to capitalize on wins, stay ready in real time, and lean into creative trends and authenticity to drive demand and how our team partners with you to make those pushes more effective.

Capitalize on Wins

North Texas: Turning a Historic Start into a Sellout

That’s exactly what happened with North Texas Football this fall. After starting the season 5–0 for the first time since 1959, the Mean Green were already trending locally and across social media. The digital team leaned into that narrative with a fast turn campaign promoting their next matchup vs. South Florida, which ultimately sold out.

The campaign combined urgency and momentum with layered targeting across audiences such as retargeting pools, fanbase segments, and North Texas affinity groups.

Platform: Meta (Facebook & Instagram)
Performance: 196K impressions | 1.43% CTR | 2,397 conversions | $47.70 ROAS
Top audiences: Retargeting (1,196 conversions), UNT Affinity (791), Fanbase (197)

The result? A sellout game, an energized fan base, and a prime example of how quickly activated creative and audience layering can transform buzz into measurable revenue and success.

University of Illinois: Good Season Start

Kicking off the season hot, Illinois jumped at the opportunity to showcase their 3-0 standings for the start of the football season. The messaging is light and fun with emojis and play-on-words, paired with hype videos and imagery of winning highlights. The team also took advantage of some game-day adjacent interest targeting to help reach new new fans, like tailgating and grilling.

Platform: YouTube, Meta (Facebook & Instagram)
Performance: 145K Overall impressions | .94% Meta CTR | .44% YouTube CTR | 133 Overall Conversions | $27 Overall ROAS
Timeline: Starting after the 3rd win of the season, the ads ran until one of the games announced a sellout.

The heightened performance on these ads, proves that it matters when you celebrate wins!

Be Ready: Activate Fast & Stay in the Moment

Waiting to move can often lead to demand dying quickly, so planning for agility is crucial.

Budget Buffers: Reserve a small portion of your ad budget for potential opportunities as they pop up throughout the year.
Workflows: Monitor social sentiment and local media coverage to alert you when something is trending then deploy.
Geo-target local zones: When word spreads, push into new ZIP codes or high traffic markets to catch spillover interest.

BGSU: Turning a Viral Moment into Real Revenue

Not all momentum comes from the scoreboard. Sometimes, it’s something completely unexpected that captures the internet’s attention. For Bowling Green Football, that moment came courtesy of a viral cat named Pudge, a campus favorite whose fame exploded online. The marketing team quickly built a “Pudge Promo Package” around the meme, tapping into the organic buzz with fun, shareable creative that fans loved.

Platform: Meta (Facebook & Instagram)
Performance: 54K impressions | 0.96% CTR | 184 conversions | $18.76 ROAS
Creative Approach: Playful graphics and language that leaned into the viral tone while still driving a clear call to action.

Pudge demonstrates how viral content, when paired with quick creative adaptation and targeted delivery, can become more than a fun moment but directly impact ROI.

WWTR: Converting a “Last Chance” Moment Into Ticket Sales

When NHRA driver Brittany Force announced that this would be her final season before the NHRA Midwest Nationals at World Wide Technology Raceway the team knew they had a rare, time-sensitive story. Our team collaborated with WWTR to update creative assets and launch new Meta ads emphasizing the urgency.

Platform: Meta (Facebook & Instagram)
Creative Focus: Emotional, time sensitive messaging highlighting Brittany’s farewell moment and connecting fans to ticket urgency.

The rapid turnaround helped capitalize on the buzz, helping drive last minute ticket sales as the top-performing creative in the campaign. This reinforces how fast execution can turn breaking news into real revenue.

Creative Trends That Work: UGC & Authentic Real Moments

During times when organic demand may be low, authenticity can be the best lever to activate. Fans scroll past polished ads every day. What stops them is content that feels real, human, and in the moment.

User-generated content (UGC): Fan selfies, reaction videos, post show ovations, and backstage glimpses, POV's the list goes on.
Athlete or performer takeovers: Let cast members, musicians, or players record short, casual clips you can run as ads.
Short live content as ads: Ephemeral content such as stories, TikTok's, and vertical phone footage often times outperforms studio creative when demand is low.
Moment driven hooks: Copy like “See it live,” “Last chance,” “Be part of the moment,” “Don’t just hear about it” drives urgency and FOMO.

Authenticity can be the differentiator. Locker-room clips or cast selfie's can often outperform polished creative because it is real and relatable. This doesn’t replace your high quality assets but instead complements them. Running polished creative alongside user generated content gives you coverage across both emotional and professional tones.

Popejoy Hall: Turning TikTok into Ticket Demand

Popejoy Hall launched one of its top performing TikTok campaigns of all time and it didn’t come from a TV spot or agency produced trailer. Instead, a team member filmed a 1 minute TikTok style video that felt organic to the platform and even showed exactly where to buy tickets on the website. That native, helpful, “peer-to-peer” feel resonated more than traditional creative.

Approach: Raw, vertically shot TikTok content built by the internal team, promoted as paid ads.
Why it worked: It blended into the feed and replicated how real users share experiences —not how brands advertise.
Performance: 74 Shares | 0.56% CTR | 30 conversions | $11.88 ROAS (6X the accounts average)

This is clear indicator that authenticity is not always about production value but meeting users in the format and tone they already consume. On platforms where users expect unfiltered content. Real feeling ads outperform because UGC content is no longer just a trend but instead has become a language of how people consume live entertainment across the board.

OKC Civic Center Music Hall: Real Moments Over Studio Assets

Similarly, OKC Civic Center Music Hall moved away from relying solely on staged, polished trailers and began incorporating casual audience reactions, POV style clips, and organic feeling creative into their sponsored campaigns. By leaning into TikTok trends and native “For You Page” behavior, OKC Civic Center is using evergreen POV content to show what attending an event actually feels like content that looks like something a friend would post, not a brand.

Approach: Promote handheld, at the show footage and POV style social trends instead of only formal trailers.
Why it works: It blends seamlessly into the feed and hits new audiences who engage more with native content than branded assets.
Result: Higher engagement rates and stronger conversion lift within retargeting and affinity pools.

When possible, test multiple lightweight formats in parallel to the usual creative assets to see which resonates in low demand windows. The highest performing creative is often not the most expensive to produce, but the most authentic to consume.

Conclusion: When Demand Slows, Digital Does the Heavy Lifting

Generating demand proactively is both an art and science. It’s about staying alert, leaning into wins, amplifying authentic moments, and targeting strategically.

Let’s turn quiet periods into opportunity. Reach out to your PAC Digital strategist today to build a demand plan that finds lift even when the buzz isn’t there... yet.

As we head into the holiday season when promotions, gifting, and year end urgency drive demand, explore these additional resources: