The #BringDraketoDrake campaign won the American Marketing Association’s statewide category for Best Public Relations Campaign. Additionally, the initiative earned, by vote of members and attendees, the People’s Choice Award.

The summary of the award nomination read:
Last fall, a mid-sized private university in the heart of the Midwest brought the world’s hottest rapper to campus—and made international headlines in the process. Drake University’s “Bring Drake to Drake” campaign leveraged media relations, social media, real-time marketing, and word-of-mouth tactics to engage target audiences and increase brand awareness and affinity. By the time Aubrey “Drake” Graham shared a photo of himself perched atop Drake University’s welcome sign—decked out in a University letterman’s jacket—with his more than 30 million Instagram followers, it was a pleasant bonus for a viral campaign that had already received international attention and created lifelong memories. Associating the Drake brand with a world-famous and occasionally controversial rapper was a calculated risk—but one the communications staff would do again, not only because it brought unprecedented visibility to the University, but also because (as the rapper would say), #YOLO. You only live once.

—Niki Smith, University Communications