How to Market Yourself for NIL

To market yourself for NIL, student-athletes need to build a clear personal brand, create consistent content, grow an engaged audience, and pitch the right brands with a professional message. The best NIL opportunities come from showing brands who you are, what audience you reach, and why a partnership makes sense.

Expert Insight: After a series of sports business jobs in the NHL and NBA, I made the jump to NIL consulting and education at the college level. When the 2025 House vs. NCAA settlement allowed colleges to bring their NIL programs in-house and pay athletes directly, I joined IMG Academy to help develop an NIL department geared toward teaching elite high-school athletes how to best position themselves for NIL deals throughout the course of their athletic development. In this guide, I'll share the NIL branding tips I use with athletes and families during IMG Academy NIL workshops.

Key Takeaways

• Student-athletes can market themselves for NIL by building a personal brand, creating consistent content, and reaching out to aligned brands.

• Strong NIL branding starts with knowing who you are, what makes you different, and what audience you can reach.

• Brands often look for professionalism, audience engagement, content quality, personal values, and a clear reason to partner.

• Social media matters for NIL, especially for high school athletes, but follower count is only one part of the equation.

• A strong NIL pitch should explain who you are, why the brand is a fit, what you can offer, and how the partnership could work.

What NIL Means for Student-Athletes

NIL stands for name, image, and likeness. As the NCAA explains, "Student-athletes may receive compensation from third parties for use of their name, image, and likeness (NIL), such as social media posts, brand appearances, or promoting products and services. All three NCAA divisions support opportunities for student-athletes to pursue NIL consistent with rules that protect fair competition." This allows athletes to earn money from their personal brand.

NIL rules can vary by state, school, athletic association, and level of competition. Before signing any agreement, athletes and families should confirm what is allowed with their school, state association, college compliance office, or trusted advisor.

Why Marketing Yourself Matters for NIL Opportunities

NIL deals are not just about being a top athlete. Businesses enter NIL partnerships because they believe an athlete can help them reach an audience, tell a story, or build a meaningful connection with customers. That means your personality, values, interests, and online presence can matter just as much as your stats.

Strong athlete marketing for NIL helps brands understand three things: who you are, who you reach, and why you are a good fit for their business. If you can clearly communicate those points, you are in a stronger position to start conversations with potential partners.

How to Build a Strong NIL-Ready Brand

At IMG Academy, I lead NIL workshops for athletes, teach a course on NIL, and consult with families about the NIL process. The most important part of pursuing NIL deals is building your personal brand.

Think of your personal brand like marketing a business. What is your brand? Who do you market yourself to, and what do you market yourself as? You must know who you are.

To help student-athletes develop their brands, I challenge them to ask themselves four important questions.

Define Your Personal Brand

How do people view you?

Think about your coaches, teammates, teachers, family, and friends. How do they portray you in public settings and private settings? How you're seen—and how you want to be seen—is an extremely important element of your personal brand.

What separates you from other athletes?

The brands that sponsor amateur athletes get hundreds, if not thousands, of emails in search of NIL partnerships, and if you're using AI or writing generic pitches, your email will go straight to the "delete" box. Think about the things that separate you from other athletes—those are the things that will make you stand out.

You can talk about challenges that you face. Did you move schools? Did you have to change sports? Did you have to change positions? Did you have an injury? What challenged you in a way that demonstrates your resilience and adaptability?

Another thing we talk about frequently when it comes to standing out is your performance on the court or on the field. If you're a top recruit, that's obviously going to separate you, and you'll want to use that to your advantage. But what you do off the field can be just as important.

Align Your Brand With Your Sport, Values, and Passions

What are your passions outside of your sport?

The last question I ask athletes to think about is what they're passionate about when they step off the field. Those interests are the industries you should start with when proposing deals to brands. If you love hunting and fishing, would you be pitching Bass Pro Shops or Blick Art Materials?

Create Consistent Content

Consistency is key in the NIL world. Think about your favorite podcast, show, or creator. You probably know what kind of content to expect and how often it appears.

You do not need to post every day, but you should create a realistic content plan you can maintain. If you post once and then disappear for several weeks, it becomes harder to build momentum with your audience.

A simple content calendar can help. Plan content around training, competition, school life, recovery, hobbies, community involvement, and personal milestones. The goal is to show your audience who you are over time.

Build an Engaged Audience

Follower count can matter, but engagement is just as important. Brands want to know that people are paying attention to your content. An athlete with a smaller but loyal and engaged audience may be more valuable to a local business than an athlete with more followers but little interaction.

Some brands may have follower-count expectations, while others care more about community fit, content quality, or local influence. Instead of focusing only on a number, focus on creating content people respond to and building trust with your audience.

How to Use Social Media for NIL Opportunities

Social media is one of the most important tools for NIL marketing because it gives brands a quick way to understand your personality, audience, and professionalism. Before a brand works with you, it will likely review your profiles.

Ask yourself: What would people learn about you from your social media?

If somebody were to visit your social media, what would they know about you? For some, the online identity is different than the in-person identity, but you'll be better off if your social media persona is aligned with your true self.

Be considerate about everything you post online because brands do their homework. Before they enter any deal, they'll do their due diligence to see what you're posting, and mixed messages are the type of thing that might turn them away.

For more guidance, explore IMG Academy+ resources on building your online identity and using social media as a student-athlete.

The Best Social Media Platforms for NIL Deals

Every social media platform has its own mindset because each one delivers content differently. Depending on your personality and the content you're trying to create, I recommend different platforms.

Instagram: If you've got a knack for photography and love sharing still images, or you've got an off-field hobby that lends itself to photography, Instagram is a great platform.

TikTok: If you're funny or goofy, TikTok is a great platform for short-form videos. Finding the right platform for your unique personality is important.

X (formerly Twitter): If you're analytical and enjoy diving into statistics or engaging in conversations about your sport, X is the platform for that.

YouTube: If you enjoy creating and editing longer videos, YouTube is an excellent platform, though it requires more time and effort.

You do not need to be active everywhere. It is better to choose the platforms that fit your strengths and post consistently than to create accounts you cannot maintain.

Keep Your Social Media Professional

No matter what platforms you're using to market yourself, it's important to always keep professionalism in mind. You need to have a public account and, where applicable, it should be a business or creator account because you'll need access to engagement numbers from your dashboard when it comes time to reach out to potential partners.

On all platforms, choose a username, profile photo, and bio that are clean and easy to understand. Businesses are going to search your name, and if your profile is crowded with inside jokes or memes that visitors won't understand, that's a big red flag. If they visit your social media and get the impression that you're immature, they won't want to work with you.

No matter where you live, it's critically important to avoid restricted categories like alcohol, cannabis, and gambling. Even for college athletes who are already 21 years old, I give the same advice: stay away from drugs and alcohol. That's not what businesses want to see, so be smart.

Positivity also matters. Keep focusing on your hard work, supporting your team and your teammates, and sharing the things you love to do.

When to Start Thinking About Your NIL Brand

In many states, athletes can earn NIL endorsements as early as their freshman year of high school, but those deals are extremely rare. While collegiate athletes can earn NIL money through team-wide endorsements, autograph signings, training camps, and appearances, high school athletes are usually limited to deals tied to their social media.

For athletes in eighth grade and early high school, I recommend focusing on building their brands and growing their social media following. Brands tend to have a follower-count threshold, and if you don't meet that threshold, you're unlikely to get a response to your pitch. If your engagement isn't reaching enough people, it's not worth their investment.

For many mid-sized businesses, 10,000 followers is a good starting point for potential NIL deals. Those 10,000 followers can be spread across multiple platforms.

Get discovered by college coaches

Reading about recruiting is a great start, but the families who land scholarships don't do it alone. NCSA's Recruiting Coaches build a personalized strategy around your game, academics, and target schools so you stand out to the right programs.

Start your athlete profile

How to Market Yourself for Brands

Once you have built the foundation of your personal brand, the next step is learning how to market yourself to brands. This starts with identifying businesses that make sense for your story, audience, and goals.

Identifying the Right Brands

For many high school athletes, local businesses are a smart place to start. Think about businesses connected to your community, your sport, your routine, or your personal interests.

Start by asking:

• Do any family friends or community members own businesses?

• Are there local restaurants, gyms, training centers, or shops that already support athletes?

• Do you regularly use a product or service that fits your lifestyle?

• Are there brands connected to your hobbies outside of sports?

Local businesses may be more open to a conversation because they understand your community and may already know your story. These early partnerships can also help you build an NIL portfolio for future opportunities.

For example, there was a sub shop down the street from where I grew up, and I used to go there all the time after baseball games. If I had been able to do NIL in college, I would have gone back to that sub shop and said, "Hey, you were literally my postgame fuel for eight years. Now I've made it to the next level, and I want to give back to the small-town sub shop that helped me get to where I am." Start the conversation with businesses that already have a connection to your story.

Develop Your NIL Portfolio

Another advantage of starting with your personal network and local businesses is that a strong portfolio will make future pitches much more effective. If you've already worked with four or five partners, have solid engagement numbers, and a healthy follower count, you're in a much better position to approach larger brands. At that point, your portfolio does much of the talking for you.

Creating a NIL Pitch

Once you've identified the right brands and built your social media presence accordingly, it's time to create your pitch. Make sure the right pieces of your story are included before you begin reaching out to businesses.

Emphasize Your Strengths and Personality

People aren't following you online simply because of what you do on the field—it's about who you are as a person. Audiences and businesses don't necessarily care if you're riding the bench or if you're having an average season.

They're following you for entertainment, education, highlights, recruiting insights, day-in-the-life content, or another experience you provide. Focus your pitches on the value you're creating and the story you're telling, not just your athletic performance.

Stay Focused and Consistent With Your Personal Brand

Consistency is key in the NIL world. Think about your favorite podcast. You know when new episodes come out because the creator sticks to a schedule.

It's OK if you don't have the time or desire to post every day, but you should decide what posting schedule you can realistically maintain and stick to it.

If you want to succeed in the NIL space, you can't post once and then disappear for three or four weeks. I encourage athletes to create a content calendar and plan what they'll share in advance. If posting regularly becomes difficult during your season, scheduling tools can help automate your content.

What to Include in a NIL Pitch

Your NIL pitch should make it easy for a brand to understand who you are and what a partnership could look like.

Sample NIL pitch structure:

• Start with a short introduction.

• Explain your connection to the brand.

• Share what makes your audience or story valuable.

• Suggest one or two partnership ideas.

• Close with a clear next step.

Before signing any NIL agreement, athletes should review the terms carefully, understand exactly what they're agreeing to deliver, and confirm the deal complies with the rules for their school, state, athletic association, and future college program. IMG Academy+ also offers guidance on contracts and due diligence.

Athlete Branding Supports NIL Success

It's difficult to put an exact number on how many high school athletes receive NIL deals. At a school like IMG Academy, where many athletes go on to compete at Power Four programs, the percentage is naturally higher than it would be at a typical public high school.

For many high school athletes who find success with NIL, the most common opportunities are in-kind partnerships, where compensation comes in the form of products or services rather than cash. Those partnerships still provide valuable experience and help build your NIL portfolio before moving on to college athletics.

NIL Opportunities in Individual Sports

In popular college sports, many NIL partnerships come through group licensing deals negotiated by the institution. A football player at a top-tier program, for example, may benefit from multiple NIL opportunities as soon as they arrive on campus.

I've always enjoyed working with athletes in individual sports like golf and tennis because the opportunities can be especially creative.

I worked with a nationally ranked collegiate golfer who couldn't wear outside logos during the college season, but during the summer wanted to offset tournament expenses like travel and entry fees. We developed a strategy to partner with different brands that sponsored individual tournaments throughout the offseason. Athletes in individual sports often have much more flexibility outside their competitive season, creating unique NIL opportunities.

Personality Over Performance

Does being great at your sport help with NIL opportunities? Absolutely. But having a compelling personality and authentic story can be just as valuable.

A great example is former college gymnast Livvy Dunne, who earned millions through NIL endorsements. While she competed for LSU, much of her NIL success came from building an incredibly marketable personal brand—not simply from competitive results.

If you're an authentic person with a compelling story and genuine passion for what you share, audiences care about that. Your personal brand comes from who you are, not just what happens on the field.

Final Tips for Building NIL Opportunities

Learning how to market yourself for NIL takes time. Start by building a personal brand that reflects who you are, then create content that supports that brand. Focus on professionalism, consistency, and authentic partnerships.

As you grow, continue tracking your audience, saving examples of your best content, and building a portfolio of previous partnerships. Most importantly, make sure every NIL opportunity aligns with your values and follows the rules for your school, state, athletic association, and future college program.

To continue building your NIL knowledge, explore more IMG Academy+ resources covering NIL education, college recruiting, athlete development, and IMG Academy+ programs.

FAQs About Marketing Yourself for NIL

How do athletes market themselves for NIL?

Athletes market themselves for NIL by building a personal brand, creating consistent content, growing an engaged audience, and reaching out to brands that align with their story, values, and audience. A strong NIL strategy demonstrates who the athlete is, what they can offer, and why a partnership makes sense.

What makes an athlete attractive to NIL brands?

Brands often look for professionalism, strong content, an engaged audience, a compelling personal story, and values that align with their business. Athletic success can help, but personality, consistency, and audience fit are equally important.

What should athletes include in a NIL pitch?

A NIL pitch should include the athlete's name, sport, school, location, audience information, connection to the brand, partnership ideas, and a clear next step. When available, athletes should also include examples of previous content, engagement metrics, or links to their portfolio.

Does social media matter for NIL?

Yes. Social media plays an important role because it allows brands to evaluate an athlete's audience, content style, and professionalism. For many high school athletes, early NIL opportunities are closely tied to social media content, local promotions, and personal branding.

How does athlete branding support NIL?

Athlete branding helps businesses understand what an athlete represents and why people follow them. A strong personal brand makes it easier to create content, identify the right partnerships, and develop authentic NIL opportunities.

Who can earn NIL money?

The NIL landscape continues to evolve, but currently, high school and college athletes in most states are eligible to participate in NIL opportunities. Athletes should always understand the rules and restrictions that apply in their state, athletic association, and school before pursuing partnerships.

What NIL deals should I absolutely avoid?

Athletes should avoid any NIL opportunities prohibited by their state, athletic association, or institution, including pay-for-play arrangements tied to athletic performance. They should also avoid sponsorships involving restricted categories such as drugs, alcohol, cannabis, and gambling, as those partnerships can negatively affect future opportunities with coaches and sponsors.

Can I make a lot of NIL money as a high school athlete?

It's uncommon for high school athletes to earn significant income through NIL, especially if they don't attend nationally recognized programs or project to compete at a Power Four school. Most high school athletes begin with in-kind partnerships for products and services while focusing on growing their brand, audience, and NIL portfolio before college.

Can I earn NIL money without social media?

At the college level, athletes may earn NIL income through autograph signings, public appearances, camps, clinics, and similar opportunities. For most high school athletes, however, NIL opportunities are still primarily centered around social media and personal branding.