Marketing Portfolio

Sara Ismail

I have built audiences, created content, managed brand partnerships, and studied why people behave the way they do online. This portfolio is about what I have learned from doing all of those things at once.
Sara Ismail
Marketing · Creator Strategy · Social
33.3M+
Combined Organic Views
572K+
Total Shares
Zero Paid
Amplification
All Performance Earned
My Perspective

I have been on both sides.

Most people working in influencer marketing have approached it from one direction. They have either made content or managed it. My career has involved both.

I started creating content in 2021, built a travel community of 48K+, and worked directly with tourism companies on sponsored partnerships. Through Barstool Sports I led content strategy for a Barstool-affiliated digital media brand, growing it to 30K+ followers. At the same time I was running marketing and brand partnership operations for Her Campus UFL, managing campaigns with Estee Lauder, Valentino, Mugler, and Kiehl's on the organizational side.

I also hold an MS in Marketing, a minor in Communication Studies, and work on brand strategy projects through Be Busy Being Awesome, a boutique marketing agency.
Experience across
Content creation UGC Social strategy Brand partnerships Campaign execution Audience development Brand strategy
Background
MS Marketing, UF 2026 Communication Studies Consumer Behavior AI Fundamentals Bilingual English / Spanish
Performance

What 33 million views actually taught me

I started paying serious attention to shares, not views. Views happen when an algorithm serves content. Shares happen when a person decides another person needs to see something.
33.3M+
Combined Views
Across two accounts, all organic
Zero Paid
Promotion
Every view earned
No ad spend, ever
572K+
Total Shares
The metric I care about most
6
Reels over 1M views
Across formats and tones
Reach Content Shares Like Rate Why it worked
10.96M Live concert footage, Fleetwood Mac Emotional storytelling 94,424 11.2% Unscripted emotional response. High-share content driven by collective nostalgia.
3.33M Format-driven social commentary Trend / format innovation 191,522 17.6% Highest share rate. People sent it to replicate the format, not just react.
1.94M Cultural moment, trend-timed campus content Trend awareness / timing 69,938 11.8% Published at peak cultural relevance. Timing as strategy.
1.39M Reaction to graduate education data point Identity / social observation 55,413 8.1% Spread through identity-aligned communities. Observation hit closest.
1.14M University graduation milestone content Identity / milestone 7,667 6.3% Timed to a shared life transition. Audience used it to express what they felt.
UGC and Brand Partnerships

Working with brands

The following work spans paid sponsored content, gifted PR collaborations, and UGC campaigns. I have noted the nature of each because different formats require meaningfully different creative approaches.
Photowall Sweden
Photowall Sweden
Gifted PR
Bedroom Transformation, Gallery Wall
Built around a room redesign narrative so the product became the reason the room looked different, not an object held up to camera. The content is ongoing as the transformation develops.
Product integration should feel like a natural part of the story, not a pause in it.
EyeBuyDirect — Olive Girl Fall
EyeBuyDirect
Paid Sponsored Content
Trend-Led Integration, Olive Girl Fall
Paid promotional Reel built around the olive girl fall trend. Eyewear worn naturally throughout rather than presented to camera. The trend was the hook; the product lived inside it.
Trend fluency is a creative tool. Find where the brand fits inside what people already care about.
Kurt Geiger
Kurt Geiger
UGC — Product for Content
Day-in-My-Life, Footwear Integration
Short-form day-in-my-life video with shoes integrated naturally throughout real daily activity. The goal was to show the product worn in context, not featured as the subject.
UGC that performs is content the audience would have watched anyway, with the product already inside it.
Valentino Beauty — Her Campus activation
Valentino Beauty
Brand Activation
Her Campus UFL Campaign
Managed the activation, content deliverables, and campaign execution across the Her Campus member network. Direct experience on the organizational side of a beauty brand collaboration.
Managing a campaign from the inside teaches you what brands actually need from a creator relationship.
"The content that spreads is never the content that tries to. It is the content that makes someone feel genuinely understood."
Sara Ismail · On what makes content travel
How I Think About Branded Content

The product is not the content. It is part of it.

The most common mistake in creator marketing is treating sponsored content like an interruption. The brand gets 30 seconds and then the creator goes back to being themselves. Audiences feel that gear shift and it costs the brand credibility.

What works is when the product becomes part of something the audience would have watched anyway. That means finding where it fits naturally inside a story, a moment, or an opinion.

The briefs that produce the best content give a clear objective and then step back. Tell me who you are trying to reach, what you want them to feel, and what the non-negotiables are. Then let the creator find the way in.
Natural integration The product should make sense in the context it is placed in. If it feels inserted, the audience already knows.
Creator voice Sponsored content that sounds like a press release is content the audience skips.
Audience trust An audience will follow a creator through a sponsorship if they believe the creator would actually use what they are promoting.
Platform behavior Content native to Reels does not automatically translate to TikTok. Format, pacing, and hook all need to match where it lives.
Performance feedback What happened after the post should change the next brief, not just sit in a report.
Social Media and Content Strategy

Growing a media brand with intention

Barstool Sports Viceroy Program · Gator Chicks · April 2024 – May 2026

Gator Chicks was a Barstool Sports-affiliated digital media brand at the University of Florida. I was responsible for the full content strategy, creative direction, and audience development of the account.

The central challenge was building a distinct identity for a specific community while staying inside Barstool's larger brand. I created and launched Gator Chicks Mic'd Up, an original format combining street-style interviews, game-day commentary, and campus culture moments.

I also wrote a formal brand voice and content transition guide for incoming administrators. Timing was the skill I underestimated most: some of the best-performing content came from recognizing what people were talking about that afternoon and making the brand part of that conversation the same day.

30K+
Followers
6.3M+
Total Views
91.8%
Engagement Growth / 8 Months
200K+
Top Reel Performance
Professional Takeaway
Understanding where you are posting, who you are posting for, and what they need from that content in context is a skill that transfers directly into creator marketing and partnerships roles.
Brand Partnerships and Campaign Execution

The other side of the deal

Her Campus UFL · President and Head of Marketing · August 2022 – May 2026

As President and Head of Marketing simultaneously, I led a team of 50+ members and owned the full marketing strategy and brand partnership operations for Her Campus UFL.

This role gave me direct experience on the organizational side of a creator relationship. I was the point of contact responsible for making the campaign actually happen: aligning on objectives, coordinating deliverables, managing timelines, and ensuring the brand got what it needed.

Estee Lauder
Valentino Beauty
Mugler
Kiehl's
Sun Bum
Sprite
What Managing Partnerships Involved
Aligning with brand representatives on campaign objectives, deliverables, and timelines
Coordinating internal content teams to deliver on brand requirements correctly and on schedule
Managing product distribution across campaigns with hundreds of units per semester
Maintaining brand standards across a 50+ member organization
Communication bridge between Her Campus HQ and our local chapter
736K+
Total Platform Visibility
Across Her Campus UFL platforms during my tenure.
I have been the creator receiving a brand deal. I have also been the person making sure that deal executed correctly from the inside.
Strategy and Analytics

How I think before I post

Through Be Busy Being Awesome, a boutique marketing agency, I work on Personal Brand Blueprint projects for executives, entrepreneurs, and professionals. The deliverable is a structured strategy document built from research, not assumptions.

The skills that process develops are the same skills that creator marketing requires. Who is the audience? Where are they? What kind of content do they trust? What does success look like? The questions are structurally identical.

01
Discovery and Audience Research
Who are they trying to reach, what do those people care about, and where do they spend their attention?
02
Competitive and Market Analysis
Where does the client sit within their market and what gap can they credibly occupy?
03
Brand Positioning and Messaging
Core value proposition, tone of voice, and the right framing to reach the right people.
04
Content Strategy and Client Deliverable
Structured presentation and PDF document with actionable recommendations.
Metrics I Actively Track
Views and accounts reached Scale and distribution
Skip rate Hook effectiveness
Watch time and average duration Retention and hold
Shares and saves Resonance and lasting value
Like and comment rate Active engagement quality
Follower growth and audience composition Community development
Metrics I Understand in Professional Context
CPM and CPV Campaign cost efficiency
CTR and conversion rate Content-to-action effectiveness
EMV Earned media valuation
Engagement rate benchmarks Creator evaluation and selection
My hands-on experience is with organic content performance analysis. I have not personally managed paid influencer budgets or reported on campaign ROI in a professional capacity. I am clear about that distinction because it is more useful than a vague claim to have done everything.
Professional Value

Why the combination matters

Most people in influencer marketing understand it from one direction. My background spans both, and that is not something I stumbled into. It developed because I was genuinely interested in how the whole system works.
Creator-side perspective
I know what it feels like to receive a brief as a creator. That experience informs how I would write briefs, communicate expectations, and structure partnerships if I were managing them.
Audience behavior
I have spent years studying why people stop, watch, share, save, and follow. Performance data should change creative decisions, not just document them.
Both sides of a brand deal
I have been the creator receiving a partnership and the organizational lead making sure it executed correctly. Understanding both sides makes me useful in roles that work between brands and creators.
Research and brand strategy
Audience research, competitive analysis, brand positioning, and content strategy applied to real client projects. I know how to turn information into a clear, actionable recommendation.
Cultural awareness
Bilingual, Communication Studies background, interested in how culture and identity shape what people respond to online. Content that speaks to multicultural Gen Z audiences specifically.
Formal marketing education
MS Marketing, consumer behavior, digital marketing, and AI applications. Understanding why people make decisions is the foundation of effective creator marketing.
My background is unconventional in a useful way. I bring firsthand creator experience, brand partnership exposure from both sides, audience-building experience, formal marketing training, and a strong understanding of how content performs and why. I am especially interested in roles where those perspectives can support stronger creator selection, briefs, campaigns, and social strategy.
Contact

Let’s make something worth sharing.

Sara Ismail