For my Account Planning and Strategy course, my team developed a campaign proposing a new primary target audience for Nerds Candy. As creative lead, I developed four deliverable concepts: a six-panel TV storyboard, a 30-second podcast ad script, an out-of-home advertisement, and a 10–15-second TikTok.

Using MRI-Simmons cross-tab research, we identified Gen Z gamers as an untapped audience, finding they were 88% more likely to consume Nerds than the general public. We built our campaign, “Nerd Out with Nerds,” around integrating the brand into gaming culture and reframing the term “nerd” as a positive identity within the gaming community.

My creative concepts included a Fortnite collaboration featuring a Nerds Gummy Cluster character skin and an “Eating Nerds” emote; a podcast ad featuring streamer @vanillamace promoting a sweepstakes for viewers who watched her stream the new Nerds X Fortnite collaboration; a Photoshop-designed billboard draft for a potential Razer x Nerds headset collaboration; and a TikTok skit encouraging gaming creators to use a campaign hashtag to promote the tagline and reinforce its positive message.

Our presentation received a 93/100, with our professor commending our strong consumer insight and its consistent integration throughout the campaign. Based on feedback, I would further emphasize Nerds Candy in the Razer collaboration concept to keep candy sales central to the campaign objective. Design-wise, I would darken the background behind the lettering to improve legibility and better center the Nerds logo on the side of the headphones.

MRI-Simmons Crosstab

TikTok Advertisement

• Quick and easy to understand

• Establishes campaign and solidifies gaming and Nerds connection

• Relatable play on words with ‘nerd’ and our tagline, ‘Nerd Out.’