How sportsbooks plan to turn bracket-mania into long-term betting interest

Nothing says March Madness like a bracket—the image is quite literally part of the official NCAA logo for the tournament.

But with bracket busts all but inevitable, participation usually free, and picks just as likely made based on favorite mascots as team records, the event exists somewhat on the periphery of the sports-betting world.

Still, some traditional sportsbooks see March Madness as an ideal moment to try to sign up and retain new audiences on their platforms, especially given the cultural cache of the tournament. In other words, even if someone isn’t a bettor before March Madness, there’s a chance they might leave the tournament as one.

“March Madness, for that three weeks, brings in a very casual fan, a fan that we might otherwise not see during a basketball season,” Casey Hurbis, CMO of BetMGM, told Marketing Brew. “It’s an opportunity for us to engage new players.”

Influential

Athletes-turned-influencers are front and center in the March Madness campaigns of two major sportsbooks this year. BetMGM tapped former college hoopers Haley and Hanna Cavinder, and former LSU gymnast Livvy Dunne leads Fanatics Sportsbooks’s March Madness ad.

All three women have obvious ties to college sports, but none are currently competitive athletes, some of whom may be “a little bit hesitant to attach themselves to sports betting” due to endorsement rules, according to Matthew Bakowicz, director of the sports management program at American University’s Kogod School of Business, who previously managed sportsbook operations for DraftKings at Foxwoods Resort and Casino.

Beyond their connection to sports, Dunne and the Cavinders have serious social reach. The Cavinders have about 2 million followers combined on their individual Instagram accounts, plus another 456,000 on their joint account, while Dunne has 5.3 million Instagram followers on her own.

Fanatics worked with Dunne for its NFL campaign in the fall, resulting in boosts to brand awareness and engagement in its app in part due to her social following, Michael Fitzsimmons, SVP of brand marketing for Fanatics Sportsbook, told us. The brand’s March Madness campaign, which is part of its larger “Explained By” platform that has also featured Megan Thee Stallion and Kendall Jenner, is similarly designed to drive brand awareness and consideration, as well as engagement with its promotional offer, he said.

“We try to engage that younger audience with entertaining content,” Fitzsimmons said. “You’ll see a lot of social-first content come out over the next few weeks that is meant to be entertaining as much as it is educational and to promote an offer.”

BetMGM’s March Madness push also represents a strategy continuation for the company. The activation, “Court of Legends,” builds on its “Make it Legendary” brand campaign with Jon Hamm. BetMGM has also worked with a roster of legendary retired athletes including Derek Jeter, Wayne Gretzky, and Tim Howard.

The brand’s new campaign is digital- and social-first, Hurbis said, and it also has a significant in-person element, with the Cavinders facing off in competitions including a 3‑point contest and a 1-on-1 game at a speakeasy-style venue hidden in the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas this weekend. BetMGM users can, unsurprisingly, guess the winner.

For the girls

It’s not a coincidence that both campaigns are fronted by women. Fitzsimmons said Fanatics has intentionally cast women leads in its last three big campaigns as a way to stand out in the crowded sportsbook category, noting that women are also a “fast-growing cohort of our betting audience.”

Women are more likely to get involved with March Madness brackets than they are with many other sports-betting moments, Bakowicz said, perhaps because the tournament offers a longer runway for storytelling and cultural conversations than one-off sporting events like the Super Bowl.

“It’s a long, engaging time,” he said. “If you look at the ad campaigns and targeting strategies toward females, it’s [about] longevity, long-term investment, attaching to characters, attaching to a team, attaching to a storyline.”

And unlike the Super Bowl, March Madness also represents an opportunity to bet on women’s sports. Marketing platform Optimove found that in 2024, March Madness games featuring Caitlin Clark saw a 540% average increase in bets, a trend that continued with Paige Bueckers in 2025; her championship game with UConn saw a 430% uplift compared to the baseline established by Optimove’s analysis.

The Fanatics campaign is meant to drive engagement with both the men’s and women’s tournaments, Fitzsimmons said, and BetMGM is broadly targeting anyone of legal betting age, including “more of a passive” fan who might not typically do a lot of betting, according to Hurbis.

Long-term investment

Even if sportsbooks and other platforms succeed in getting more casual fans to make brackets or place bets, it’s another thing entirely to convince that audience to stick around after the tournament. With the World Cup—another single-elimination, bracket-style event—close on the horizon, retention is one KPI on the minds of some marketers.

Both Hurbis and Fitzsimmons said their teams are focused on user experience as part of their efforts to keep bettors active after tentpole events. BetMGM, for instance, leans into promoting its in-person casino experience as a value-add with campaigns including “Court of Legends,” while also making sure its digital experience is “fast” and “convenient.”

Fanatics, which only operates an online sportsbook, relies on offers like FanCash that can be redeemed on tickets and merchandise, and promotions like profit boosts, Fitzsimmons said. Content is also part of that equation, he added, including the “Explained by Livvy Dunne” ad, which will extend to work with a “notable college basketball face” in the next couple of weeks to further hook the March Madness audience.

“It’s part of us building a stronger relationship with the fan over time,” he said. “With our content, with our social, we really want it to be about relationship-building, treating our audience like fans, not just like bettors.”